Let me share my experince with you. At present Im consulting for a company and it was the CEO that invited me and I mean I atracted him.The company direct and indirect work force is over 200.
The first time I got to this company via an invitation for presentation I had an option to chose btw my Faith as a christian and opportunity-I was giving appoint on sunday morning.The company bow to my choice.I decided to do a model service to understand what they communicated-it cost me money and time.Eventualy I lost the deal to old player and politics.2 years later the CEO saw the integrity,competence,and 2nd generation idea and innovation.Though I lost the deal I improve my self and God favour me.I back inside for a big deal

In my opinion, reaching the CEO can also play an interesting role in the recruitment of new talent, especially in the advertising industry.

See, for example, the experiment by a young graduate called Tijs Vrolix (tijsvrolix.be/six), who wanted to find out how many click it would take for his "Hi, I'm looking for a job"-email to reach the inbox of a CEO.

Based on the "Six degrees of separation" theory, the idea was to cleverly use all the technologies at your disposal to get noticed by the CEO himself/herself, instead of sticking to classic 'pull' recruitment procedures.

Since the email will be passed on from person-to-person (on average 6 -- in theory) the message will not arrive as 100% unsolicited communication, because the previous node was someone familiar (to the CEO).

The problem with all this attention on how to reach the CEO, is that the customer apparently disappeared completely out of focus. In a well managed company, the key challenge is not how to reach my CEO, but how to serve customers even better. A CEO who does not have time for me, because she is talking with clients, is a good CEO.

If your success depends upon reaching your CEO directly, instead of creating happy customers, then you are facing a considerable challenge. In my opinion, the challenge of finding a better job. Enterpreneurship is about ideas and customers, not about politics. If you like politics, run for president, not a company.