About CEO Connection

CEO Connection is about relationships and access. With more than 17,000 CEOs in our community, CEOC functions as a proactive peer network where the connections are made for you.

We deliver proactive, curated, customized connections while minimizing the amount of your time required. We level the playing field for mid-market CEOs.
It is no longer about who you know. It is about who we know and who our members know, which we then put to work to help you.

It is about mid-market CEOs helping each other and changing the world!

Our Mission

CEO Connection is the only membership organization in the world focused exclusively on mid-market CEOs. Our mission is to help mid-market CEOs succeed. We accomplish this by connecting them with each other—connecting them with the people, information, resources and opportunities to which they would otherwise not have access—and representing the interests and perspectives of the mid-market.

There is Strength in Numbers

CEOC develops programs and benefits that we can do better collectively than you can do on your own.

Everything we do is based on three principles:

Enlightened self-interest: You have to give to get and when you help someone else, everyone wins.

Tangible results: Networking and events are a means to an end, not an end unto themselves. The events are just an inefficient channel of distribution.

Relationships are the key to everything: There is no selling allowed.

We wrap it all around the concept of mid-market CEOs helping each other and changing the world.

Founded by CEOs, for CEOs

Kenneth Beck and George Bradt created CEO Connection to facilitate peer relationships among mid-market CEOs. Both men understood the challenges that come with leadership and, throughout their careers, valued the advice they received from their counterparts. They were not alone. Fellow CEOs also recognized the value of a strong professional network built on peer interaction.

After doing some research, George and Kenneth discovered that 40% of new CEOs fail in their first 18 months. The reason: It is lonely at the top. They had no one with whom they could talk. Then they discovered that there are a myriad of organizations out there for small business CEOs, a few for the Fortune 500, but there were none for companies in the middle. They learned that mid-market companies are too big to be small and too small to be big. They compete with larger companies with broader infrastructure and small companies that can move faster but they have unique challenges and unique opportunities. So they decided to launch an organization dedicated to helping mid-market CEOs succeed.

In May 2005, Kenneth and George held the first CEO Boot Camp. The day-long program, with its stimulating discussions and debates, created many relationships and laid the groundwork for the CEO Connection membership organization. Today, CEO Connection is a dynamic, rapidly growing network of top mid-market leaders who represent a wide variety of industries, geographic locations, and ownership structures.

Kenneth Beck, CEO and Founder
Kenneth Beck, CEO and Founder
George Bradt, Founder
George Bradt, Founder