Key Insights and Next Steps from the Executive Engagement CMA Meet-Up

Last Friday, we had an Executive Engagement follow-up to the Jan 23rd meet-up with CMA members on this topic. Here are the takeaways. I am working on a session for CMA community to learn more about Executive Engagement. What it is and what it is not. The meetup was pretty amazing. Based on registrations, we expected 10, and 20 attended. What blew us away was the candor and depth of the discussion. This is a small but serious group of people shaping something that will become more strategic over the next few years. We don't record as we want people to be open and most of the people on the call are running EE programs. We distributed a new report at the meetup (attached): The Rise of Executive Engagement. It's based on an analysis of the LinkedIn profiles of 200+ EE practitioners. Link to download will be available next week. Will post it when it is live. Key takeaways. 1- This role is still forming in real time. So many of you stepped into EE roles in the last couple of years. We’re not inheriting playbooks — we’re writing them. 2- Executive engagement is not about events. As Tamie framed it, it’s about building long-term, peer relationships that become strategic assets for the business. That distinction felt important. 3- Executive sponsor programs are hard. Scale, credibility, clarity of purpose — all recurring themes. The programs that work seem to have strong peer alignment, clear guardrails, and intentional orchestration. 4-Consistency > transactions. Several of you reinforced that this can’t be a “big meeting tied to a deal” motion. The strongest programs build sustained executive coverage and cadence across priority accounts. 5- Measurement is maturing. Beyond attendance or activity, we’re seeing focus on deal velocity (2-3x faster), close rates (60%), executive coverage, and real revenue influence. We'll reach out very soon with the next set of meetups....Irwin