Schmoozers Seek Better Community

On a recent Wednesday morning, a long breakfast table at the Regency Club in Westwood was crowded with orange juice and water glasses, purple roses in blue vases, and enough muffins and coffee cake to fuel 30 people.

Each place at the white linen-covered table was elegantly set: two forks, a spoon, a knife--and a half-inch-thick stack of business cards.

Although the most pressing question seemed to be about breakfast--oatmeal or eggs benedict?--those cards were the most important items on the table, because each represented a wealth of human capital.

But this was not your typical corporate meet-and-greet. As much as the participants might have been inclined to swap pointers about the ins and outs of capital gains taxes, they had arrived at the Regency at 7:45 a.m. to talk charity.

Before breakfast was over, they would share stories from their work trying to improve the lives of children, fund Alzheimer’s research, beautify Hollywood and care for America’s veterans. And, if all went well, a few matches would be made between nonprofits hungry for new blood and the businesspeople around the table.

That’s the point of the networking events hosted by Carl Terzian, president of a West Los Angeles public relations firm that bears his name. Terzian has been organizing these events for 30 years.

His obsession with matching nonprofit groups and potential donors, volunteers and board members, is a way, he admits, to help his own business. But he thinks his events are also about serving the greater community. They are a reminder that charity is, after a fashion, a business, and that, as in any business, connections are a key to success.

The names and titles of those attending this particular morning indicated an eclectic mix, including a graphic designer, a wealth management consultant, a corporate headhunter, a major gifts officer for the United Jewish Fund and four executives from the Southern California chapter of Easter Seals. Some were Terzian clients. Others were interesting people Terzian has met in many years as a philanthropic salonista.

Before each one stood for an introduction, Terzian recited that person’s resume from memory, ticking off important and insignificant details at the same rapid-fire pace. He described how a corporate jet company, whose senior vice president sat at one end of the table, had doubled its size since Sept. 11. A female attorney with her own firm, he said, was “a combination of Barbra Streisand and Bette Midler.”

Guests were encouraged to leave their professional titles behind and talk about what Terzian calls the back of the business card: who they are as human beings. One executive spoke about her niece, who is severely handicapped and uses a computer to communicate; another mentioned his recent honeymoon.

It took nearly three hours to get around the table.

But incorporating the personal with the professional, Terzian said, is fundamental to making connections among those seated at the table, as are his own introductions.

“It’s important for me to bring out in your background that you went to college in Pittsburgh, because maybe I know that someone else knows Pittsburgh. Or I will say, ‘Sally doesn’t realize that she and Harry have something in common: a board that they served on together years ago.’ ”

William Browning Jr., an associate at Gilbert-Krupin, an insurance and estate planning firm, moved to the Los Angeles area from Arlington, Va., in late May.

He met Terzian soon afterward and, in the last three months, has attended six networking events: the Regency Club breakfast, as well as lunches, dinners and cocktail receptions at local clubs and hotels. The events, he said, have been crucial to his introduction to corporate and philanthropic circles in Los Angeles.

“You have to be open and realize that you may not see something right away” from the events, Browning said. “If you are in it to grow as a person, meet people and grow your network base, you will find commonalities there.”

Terzian estimates that he orchestrates 800 networking events a year--an astonishing number, even if you consider that his Rolodex holds more than 15,000 names. “And there’s no one on there that I don’t know personally,” he said.

“He’s the king of mixers,” said Mike Flory, vice president of Easter Seals of Southern California, which was the featured charity that morning. At each networking event, a Terzian client who is willing to pick up the tab acts as host. The size of the gatherings varies, from a handful of people to dozens.

At many events, representatives from nonprofits with personal connections to the host make short pitches. Later, they cull the guest list in search of people with whom they hit it off or who they think might be helpful to them in one capacity or another.

Browning said one event he attended generated eight additional meet-and-greets. Through those events, he made personal contacts with representatives for the American Parkinson Disease Assn. and the Jewish Big Brothers Assn., both groups he would like to be able to work with: the Parkinson organization because his grandfather has the disease, the Big Brothers because he got on well with the group’s executive director, who had spent time in Virginia.

Because of the personal connections, Browning said, “You get welcomed in, get asked to roll up your shirt sleeves and get involved right away.”

For the record, most people at the networking breakfast at the Regency Club chose the eggs benedict. After all, when your heart is in the right place, a little bit of caloric indulgence is acceptable. Even encouraged.