The Reasons you wont find successful CEO's at Networking Events

People generally go to events when they stand to gain something by attending -- be it a new business relationship or a potential customer.As people become more successful, the value they can provide to others rises, but the value that they get from meeting one average incremental person decreases -- partially because the opportunity cost of their time has gone up, and partially because increasingly more people want their attention, thereby decreasing the scarcity of new business relationships. Most "successful CEOs" avoid open networking events (e.g. public meetups) because they don't stand to gain much from attending. But they do attend more curated networking events, be it private dinners, CEO summits, industry conferences, and (at one extreme) elite closed events.

"Really successful people" do attend more broad, uncurated networking events when they are speaking or giving a presentation. This is because they can take advantage of leverage -- the ability to speak to many people at once -- which more than makes up for the fact that the average attendee is probably of no use to them. Obviously I'm generalizing -- I'm sure Larry Page occasionally pops into a random University of Michigan alumni networking event just to say hello -- but this is generally how things work as CEO's move up the totem pole. On balance, attending an open event billed as a "networking event" is usually a sign that the person doesn't have a whole lot more important things to be doing. And "successful CEO's" usually have a lot of things going on at any given time.

This is the mission of National CEO Network, to preserve the time of our successful CEO's by screening and effectively connecting them with other business people based on their business needs. National CEO Network also puts together many CEO summits, conferences and workshops to better engage serious potential players in the business world.