THEBOARDROOM

D'INNERS

WHAT THE BEST-SELLING AUTHORSOF NETWORKING MAGIC SAY ABOUTOUR MAGICAL DINNERS

Source: Rick Frishman, president, Planned Television Arts, a leading public

relations firm and liII Lublin, CEO of the strategic consulting firm, Promising

Promotion. They are the authors of Guerilla Publicity and Networking Magic.

Adams Media, Avon, MA. www.adamsmedia.c9m.

B·oardroom Inc., a publisher of books and newsletters lo-cated in Stamford, Connecticut was founded in 1971 by

Marty Edelston and is best known for publishing the news-letters: Bottom line/Personal, Bottom lin.e/Health, Bottom Line/TaxHotline, and Bottom Line/Retirement. Boardroom hosts monthlydinners that are so inspirational and provide such unparallelednetworking opportunities that we decided to devote a completechapter of our book Networking Magic to them.

According to those who have attended, the Boardroom din-ners exemplify the best. They are the best, most stimulating,and entertaining networking events. They are attended by the

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best, most interesting, and articulate experts. They are held inone of the world's best and most beautiful restaurants, whichserve world-class food. The Boardroom dinners also presentan exceptional, easy-to-adapt model that you can tailor anduse to substantially boost the quality of your networking andyour life.

The Boardroom formula is to surround yourself with re-markable people-the most brilliant, exceptional, and accom-plished individuals you can find-and to create an atmospherethat will encourage them to share their wealth of ideas, wis-dom. and experiences. It sounds basic and, in some ways, it is.However. Boardroom has perfected the execution of this ideaand elevated it to glittering heights that excite the imaginationas well as the guests. The result is networking and human in-teraction at its very best-dazzling, stimulating. and inspiringexperiences that can entertain, teach, uplift, and help buildexceptional relationships.

As you read about the Boardroom dinners, think how youcan host equivalent events on a scale that will fit your budget.needs, and your particular circumstances.

"SUCCESS KNOWLEDGE ... "

"The dinners are incredible," public speaker and marketingconsultant Ken Glickman says of the Boardroom dinners. "Martybrings together such truly amazing people. He creates an atmo-sphere that encomages people to talk about what they know andthe exciting things that are occmring in their area. These eve-nings create a tremendous amount of enthusiasm and positive

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energy and besides learning a lot and making great contacts, Ialways leave with enormous motivation to make somethiJlg ex-citing happen. You learn success knowledge. which is the knowl-edge of how things really work. and the only people who canteach you that are the people who have made things happen.Marty fills the room with those types of people."

THE BACKGROUND ...

Boardroom's publications rely heavily on articles and in-formation submitted by the foremost experts and authoritiesin their fields. This approach is an outgrowth of Edelston'scuriosity and his lifelong passion to acquire knowledge and

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understanding. A voracious reader, Edelston was frequentlyinspired by the books he read, and so he often hired the au-thors to write articles for Boardroom publications on subjectsthat fascinated him. He also made a concerted effort to meetand build relationships with the authors of "the best books"and probe their expertise more deeply.

The idea for the Boardroom dinners came to Edelston afterhe attended some stimulating lunches and dinners hosted byfriends and business ..contacts. He found the guests and theconversations so magical that he decided to try to recapturethe experiences by hosting similar events. While compilingthe names of potential guests to invite to his dinners, Edelstonrealized that the experts who contributed to his publicationsand his existing contacts constituted a fabulous list. So heinvited them to his dinners. Since then, he has continued tosupplement his list with other experts he meets, hears of, orwith whom he works.

Originally, Edelston held his dinners in his New York Cityoffice, and later rented an apartment solely to house thoseevents. He hired a great caterer and sent out invitations.Experts attended, met other experts, engaged each other inriveting discussions, and enjoyed exciting, enlightening eve-nings. And no one enjoyed them more than Edelston. Soon,guests told friends about the wonders of Edelston's dinnersand as the word got out, the dinners became coveted eventsand invitations.

Eventually, Edelston's gatherings evolved into the monthlyBoardroom dinners that have been held in a private diningroom at New York City's renowned FOJlr Seasons restaurantsince 1994. .,

The Boardroom dinners are a tribute to Edelston's deep cu-riosity, his thirst for knowledge, and his unyielding passion tobuild relationships with the best and the brightest. They a.lsodemonstrate his joy and generosity in sharing with others.

Co-author Rick Frishman has attended Boardroom dinners,and considers them a tribute to Marty. "Everyone is there be-cause of Marty. The dinners center around Marty and reflecthis interests, his questions and his standards. Marty's dinnersare networking events that pay homage to a master networkerand to his amazing passion for the best. They have become sofamous because you get to spend time with remarkable people

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who you normally would never get the opportunity to evenmeet. It is an honor to be invited."

THE LOGISTICS ...

Boardroom dinners are cohosted by Edelston, MarjoryAbrams, Publisher and Brian Kurtz, Boardroom's ExecutiveVice President. The number of guests usually ranges betweentwelve and twenty-seven, but eighty people signed up for onerecent Boardroom dinner. Kurtz believes that groups of six-teen to twenty-two are ideal because seating larger groups ismore difficult and tends to make the evenings less intimate.With groups up to twenty-two, ten guests can be seated atboth sides of a single, long table with Abrams or Kurtz andEdelston at either end.

Guests are selected from a database which Boardroommaintains and include authors who have written articles forBoardroom or individuals who were featured in or interviewedfor articles in the company's publications. Other invitees areexperts Edelston, Abrams and Kurtz have met at conferences,meetings, or other events and authorities who have worked foror consulted with Boardroom. In addition, guests might havelittle or no connection with Boardroom other than the hosts'interest in them and their expertise. Selection is geared to-ward inviting the best people, not toward achieving particularmixes or adhering to any set rules.

Dinners are planned one year in advance and a schedule ofthe upcoming dinners for the year is sent to those on the invita-tion database. Out-of-town guests ca'n then plan to attend a.din-ner during a time when they will be visiting New York or theycan arrange trips to coincide with the date of a specific dinner.Each guest sends back a reply card, which is enclosed with theschedule, to inform Boardroom of the dinner he or she wishes toattend. Boardroom keeps a list of all responses and as each din-ner approaches, confirms the date with each scheduled guest.

An invitation to Boardroom dinners is a hot and prestigiousticket. Besides being invited to dine at one of the world's greatrestaurants, guests are given the rare opportunity to spend anevening engaged in stimulating conversations with an amaz-ing collection of fascinating experts. Simply being consideredas a guest is exceptionally flattering.

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Prior to each dinner, Abrams and Kurtz review the guests'biographies and create the seating arrangement. They con-sider the seating arrangement crucial and strive to make goodmatches. They strategically seat guests to build upon obvioussynergies, which they hope will encourage lively exchangesand the creation of stimulating relationships.

THE GUESTS ...

Guests decide whiCh dinner they wish to attend, so the mixis random and varies from dinner to dinner. Kurtz believesthat the randomness and constant changes make the dinnersmore dynamic. Usually, the guests represent a broad assort-ment of disciplines, but it can vary. "At one dinner we hadsix doctors with various specialties, at another we had sevenpeople who were in direct marketing and at yet another, no-body was in health care, but six financial analysts attended,"Kurtz said. "We could plan it if we wanted to, but by not plan-ning it we end up with something more interesting."

Since Boardroom places a higher premium on the qualityof the guests than on the areas of their expertise, a diverserange of businesses, professions, and disciplines have gatheredaround the table over the years. Guests have been spellboundby information disclosed by experts on everything from ter-rorism to sex therapy. Medical researchers have explained thelatest breakthroughs in their fields and a former White Housestaffer from the Kennedy White House has shared inside sto-ries about the JFK era.

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THE DINNERS ...

Each dinner is preceded by a cocktail hour, when guestsarrive, meet each other, and mingle. Guests then move to aprivate dinning room where place cards instruct them whereto sit. When the guests are seated, Edelston welcomes them.Since some guests have attended past dinners, they knowwhy they were invited, but others have no idea. So the hostsexplain that the purpose of the dinners is to bring togethersome of the brightest and most interesting people who can beassembled in one room during one evening and to encouragethem to share ideas and information while they enjoy a fabu-lous meal. "Things that you can ordinarily do on a weeknight,

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like going to the movies or the theater are okay, but there'snothing like the stimulation you get spending time with bril-liant people," Edelston stresses.

The hosts then go around the room to introduce each guestto the group, informing them about his or her area of exper-tise. In their introductions, Abrams and Kurtz find themselvesconstantly saying that this or that guest "is the world's best__ __ _ _ _." Can you think of a better way to spend anevening?

When they are introduced, each guest is asked to sharesomething with the group. For example, what they're mostproud of, or what they would like to have everybody in theroom know about them. Guests may also be asked a probingquestion such as, "What's new in your field?" or "What areyou working on?"

The hosts try to move the introductory phase along brisk-ly because they want to make sure that all of the guests areproperly introduced. However, guests can become so engrossedwith information that another guest is sharing, or find him orher so interesting, that they ask lots of questions, which slowsthe pace. For example, when a terrorism expert spoke aboutinformation he learned at the CIA, the other guests immedi-ately peppered him with so many questions that they stoppedeverything cold. "When you get great people around the table,the conversations and the dynamics are really mind-blowers,"Edelston noted. "Fabulous stuff happens."

When the main course is served, the guests have the op-portunity to meet, talk, and get to know each other. After themain course, salad is served; Edelston rings a chime to getthe guests' attention and to resume the program. Prior toeach dinner, Abrams and Kurtz review information about theguests who are expected to attend and they select stimulat-ing topics to kick off discussions. If eminent physicians are tobe in attendance, a good opening might be to ask them whatis the latest, most groundbreaking medical research nearingcompletion in their specialty area. The hosts also try to identi-fy which guests might try to monopolize the room and propareappropriate responses to bring others into the conversations.

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THE DISCUSSIONS ...

The central group discussions begin when one host directsan opening question to an expert. Opening questions are in-tended to elicit reactions and group participation. Althoughthe expert initially carries the ball, everyone present is en-couraged to speak and ask questions. The hosts constantlymonitor the discussions to keep them moving and usually letthem follow their natural course. However, if a topic plays outor if a guest hogs the floor, a host will step in and change thesubject by posing a question to another guest. Over the years,the hosts have become adept at reading guests' reactions,and, since they know the guests' bios, they can smoothly movediscussions in new directions. As a result, the group rarelystays on one topic for an entire dinner and the conversationsseldom stagnate.

"When you have people sitting around a table talking pas-sionately about their areas of expertise and sharing new de-velopments and insider stories, whether it's psychology, cardi-ology, pending legislation, entertainment, finances, or sex, it'ssimply amazing," Kurtz exclaims. "It becomes a phenomenalevening and you end up learning tons of remarkable stuff inaddition to making unbelievable network contacts."

At one time, Edelston recorded the dinners to get story ideasfor future Boardroom publications. Although the proceedingsare no longer recorded, the hosts inform their guests that theymay use information discussed during the conversations asinspirations for future content for their publications. In addi-tion, a member of Boardroom's editoria) staff usually attendseach dinner to take notes so that staff writers can follow up ongood story ideas with guest interviews.

Guests are free to exchange business cards, and during thedinner, a list is circulated to get each guest's e-mail address.which will be added to Boardroom's invitation database. Aftereach dinner, Boardroom sends follow-up packages to gueststhat include samples of its newsletters, one of its new books,and a present such as a Boardroom umbrella. A fulllisting ofthe guests' contact information and their specialties are alsoprovided with the packages.

"The people I've met through these dinners are remark-able," Kurtz said. "And co-hosting these dinners has taken

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me to a new level of intimacy with a lot of our guests. E-mailmakes it easy for me to keep in touch with them and I'm al-ways referring people to this one or that one. I've got a greatRolodex and I'm a good networker, but this has expanded mynetworking well beyond my core competencies.

"When I first started going to the dinners, they made mefeel kind of small because I realized how huge the world isand how insignificant each of us is. But now, I've gone com-pletely over in the other direction, which is that the world issuch a fantastic place. Everybody is an expert in somethingand when you can share your expertise and your passions in away that is totally giving, extraordinary things occur," Kurtzadded. That's networking magic!

HOSTING YOUR OWN ...

The moral of the Boardroom story is to surround yourselfwith remarkable people. You owe it to yourself and those youlove to meet and build relationships with the best. othingcan improve your life like associating with terrific people; itgives your life fullness. And, remember, when you build re-lationships with extraordinary individuals, you also becomeprivy to their networks, which are usually composed of equal-ly outstanding people.

So shoot for the stars, the top, the highest rung you canreach. However, in the process, don't abandon your presentcronies and network partners. Add new faces, new spice, new

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minds, and new ideas, but also don't forget your tried-and-true contacts.

Take the initiative and put yourself together with thosewho can stimulate you, excite you, teach you, broaden you,and make the nights fly by. Top people are frequently open tonew experiences and new relationships. Some may initiallysay no to your approaches, but there is always tomorrow andif your dinners or gatherings or whatever you do build goodbuzz, they'll be clamoring for an invitation. Naturally, we allcan't host lavish dinners at the Four Seasons or draw from thesame remarkable talent pool as Boardroom. Yet, we all canstart small gatherings filled with the most exceptional peoplewe know and then build upon that.

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Start with the best people you can reach. Invite your mostinteresting, enjoyable, entertaining friends and contacts. In-vite people you've heard about, but don't know. Invite peoplewhom you've wanted to meet. Select guests who are expertsin fields that interest you and in areas that you know nothingabout. It doesn't have to be all talk. If you know musicians,poets, or entertainers, then ask them to your gathering to livenup and diversify the mix.

Work on a scale that you can afford. Although good foodcertainly helps, great people should be your top priority. Sowhen you're starting out, think first about the quality of yourguests, about attracting the very best people. And if the foodis a way to attract heavy hitters, do whatever you can, withinyour means, to get them to the table. Then get them talking.

Prepare and ask questions that will make your guests ex-pound. Once they're talking, sit back and let the magic work.Only interject if a guest filibusters, gets too far off course, orthe discussion becomes dry. Then steer the conversation gen-tly by asking another question that could ignite more stimu-lating talk.

Once you get rolling, do it right. Kurtz recommends sparingno expense, "And if that means doing fewer dinners, but ma.k-ing them all 'perfect: I would recommend that."

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