They are referred to by a variety of names: CEO Forum. CEO Roundtable. Presidents' Club. Executives' Table.

Whatever phrase you prefer, these gatherings are being held more often, and are more influential and helpful to executives in a variety of businesses and industries. Distribution executives are no exception.

One such executive who has taken advantage of her CEO meeting group is Angela Boone, president and CEO of Ft. Worth Gasket & Supply Co. in Ft. Worth, Texas.

She has been part of a CEO forum that meets annually at a group member's facility. Boone's group was organized under the auspices of the Independent Sealing Distributors (ISD) of which she and her company are members.

"The topics we discuss are very broad in range," Boone says. "Things like strategic planning, mergers or sales compensation plans. Sometimes we'll analyze an actual case such as when a member had a chance to acquire a company. He talked to us about financials and competition."

Boone's involvement with her current group began in 1998. Many such meetings, she explains, combine social as well as business aspects. A Friday round of golf might be followed by dinner that evening. Saturdays consist of all-day meetings, Boone explains, at which valuable feedback and information would be exchanged.

Joe Gallagher, president of Gallagher Fluid and Supply in King of Prussia, Pa., has been a member of that same group for about a year and a half, he says.

"The biggest benefit I receive from this is getting to meet with a group of my peers, presidents and business owners, who face the same issues I face day in and day out," he says. "And they can serve as a sounding board, so you have a few people to bounce things off of."

The groups, such as the one Gallagher and Boone are in, have developed a constructive balance between being able to exchange views and information without having any worries about giving away any company secrets or otherwise off-the-record information. This is assured by the requirement that all group members have to sign a confidentiality agreement upon joining. In addition, each forum member must vote on accepting any new participants and the vote must be unanimous.

A certain amount of geographical diversity is also important for a CEO group to succeed, especially one consisting of distributors. A group made up mostly of distributors from the east, or entirely from the southwest, for example, would not be realistic, Gallagher points out.

"You can't be sitting there with [direct] competitors. You have to be comfortable with the people in the room, otherwise you're not going to be willing to speak openly about things," he says. "The chemistry is a key component. We're all comfortable with each other."

A successful forum can also expand its parameters and become more than a positive, constructive sounding board, as helpful as that can be. Topics can be added and expanded, depending on what each member's company is going through and experiencing at a given time.

"It doesn't necessarily have to do with suppliers' issues. It could be health care costs or profit-sharing plans," Gallagher says. "Anything we can find out to improve our companies is what we're there to do."

Joe Thompson is executive vice president of ISD as well as The Assn. for Hose and Accessories Distribution (NAHAD). In his role at ISD, Thompson organized the forum that Gallagher and Boone are on.

"These are people who have some familiarity with each other, for example, from being in ISD or NAHAD," Thompson explains. "But they can take it to a higher level and a more trusting relationship which can really make it the beneficial program it can be.... [Some] have, in effect, used this as their own board of directors for their company."

Boone gives an example of vital feedback she received that greatly helped her and Ft. Worth Gasket grow as a company.

"Three years ago, when I was deciding how to grow my company," she explains, "I put the plan on the table to discuss with everybody and ask for how best to [grow]. At that time, many of them had been through that same experience."

Boone recommends such a group to fellow company heads, especially distributors. But she also urges participants to do more than merely show up on time for each gathering.

"You need to invest some time," she suggests. "Some companies are satisfied with where they are [in terms of growth and profits] and may not want to invest much of their time. But everyone gives 100 percent in our group."

"It can come down to being a good matchmaking service," Thompson says, in describing his approach to setting up the groups. "We support them and make sure they can have meetings held often enough to be of value to their company without imposing too much on their time."

Prospective members submit applications which are analyzed closely by Thompson and his staff.

"We'll try to match up six to eight, sometimes as many as 10, members, based on the applications they send us," he says. "The principle is that they are peers with similar interests, but different enough that they can learn from each other and benefit. It's hard for [CEOs]...to have a situation where they can count on a highly confidential, highly trusted group of peers that they can really learn from."

Guy Murphy, president, Flex Enterprises, in Victor, N.Y., is another of Thompson's satisfied CEO forum customers. He has been involved with three different CEO groups over the past 15 years. Each group, Murphy explains, has been a source of vital information and feedback.

"All of our businesses are not the same, even though we're in the same industry, per se," he says. "With vendors, for example, the group might help you understand who's good and who's not. Who's helping out a company in a specific area and who isn't? It might be that we have a bad sales rep in our area and someone else has a good one from that same company in their area. Or they may know someone that we're unaware of and tell us to call them instead."

There may be a lot of employees working in various companies such as Murphy's but obviously, there are only a small handful of company presidents or CEOs with whom to compare notes.

"Everyone brings to the table an experience that they think helped their business since our last meeting," Murphy explains, "or an issue they may need help in. And that's pretty much what we do. We'll sit around and talk about what worked and what didn't while trying to help each other."

In his role as senior vice president-corporate relations for the National Assn. of Wholesaler-Distributors, Carl Farr has organized and overseen several such CEO roundtables. As with Thompson, he says he finds that getting the right combination of companies and executives together requires a certain matchmaking skill.

But, he adds, there's always a bit of awkwardness and reluctance about giving away the store or any company secrets.

"At the outset, I think everyone is [reluctant]," Farr says, but adds that in due time, "people look around and say to themselves, 'These are other pretty substantial businesses with competent executives running them who basically do the same things I do.'"

Beatty D'Alessandro is the CFO at Graybar, Inc. Prior to that, he was the CIO and, in that capacity, was a member of NAW's CIO Roundtables.

The CIO roundtables, he explains, met twice a year, usually in Chicago or Washington. D'Alessandro says the roundtables can be more beneficial when they are held separate from a trade show or convention.

"It can be a great opportunity to get into a room for a day or so with people who have similar problems, similar issues, and industry models," D'Alessandro says.

His CIO group, D'Alessandro recalls, consisted of 15 to 20 members so the group would be small enough to be fairly intimate. The number of members is also large enough so that members will only be called on to make a presentation about once every two or three years.

The best meetings, D'Alessandro explains, result in feedback and advice that is applicable to a variety of industry tasks. For example, at one point, he was considering possible upgrades in Graybar's technology and Web capabilities, when he attended one of his roundtables.

As he listened to fellow members, "I came to find that, of the 15 companies represented at that meeting, there were seven of us in that room who were moving in the same direction. So I came back to the office and explained how we weren't the only ones investing in this...."

"That's not Eureka perhaps, but clearly was a validation, and very helpful," D'Alessandro says.

Successful group meetings and resulting feedback are something that Thompson hopes to use to create more interest and, especially, more participation, among NAHAD and ISD executives in 2006, he says.

"The frustration we've had is getting more members involved in these programs," Thompson says. "We're convinced that if every distributor manager became part of one of these groups through the association, they'd see tremendous business value and keep coming back."

Thompson hopes that word of mouth will also alert more executives as to how helpful these forums can be. Ironically, though, the characteristics that ensure a good group—discretion, keeping things quiet between participating members—makes "word of mouth" a bit limited in how far it can spread.

"This is a model that, when it works, is very powerful for improving the business performance of the companies," Thompson says.