Ottawa's Tracey Clark Now Chairs a CEO Forum, Fixing an Old 'Miss'

Tracey Clark, a familiar name in Ottawa's business community, has a new role that she says makes up for a career decision she once got wrong.

The decision she calls "a miss"

The move traces back to an earlier offer. While Clark was at Bridgehead, she was invited to join a CEO peer group. "At the time, she declined and now calls the decision 'a miss,'" the Ottawa Business Journal reports. That regret is the reason she decided to join MacKay CEO Forums in March as a forum chair.

In other words, a leader who once passed on a peer group is now running one for other executives in the city.

How her forum works

The structure is fairly simple. Clark's group is made up of 12 to 14 local CEOs. They meet six times a year for a full day, and once a year for a two-day retreat.

Clark focuses on leaders from companies that make $5 million to $100 million in revenue. That range covers established local businesses rather than start-ups or large corporations, and it is the part of the market where a chief executive may have few peers inside their own company to talk things through with.

A career with plenty of Ottawa roots

The forum chair role follows a busy stretch of local work for Clark. She started it as she finished work with various boards around Ottawa, including the Community Foundation of Ottawa.

She has also opened Linden Pizza, a neighbourhood restaurant at the corner of Beechwood and Chapleau avenues, a reminder that her career has included running a street-level business as well as sitting on boards and leading at Bridgehead.

Last year, she received a lifetime award from the Ottawa Business Journal and the Ottawa Board of Trade. The Ottawa Business Journal notes that the award came before she took on the MacKay CEO Forums role.

What it means for Ottawa's business scene

For local CEOs running companies in the $5 million to $100 million bracket, Clark's forum is one more option for structured peer support, with a chair who has experience on both the corporate and the restaurant side of Ottawa business. Her own story is also an argument for the format: she says she should have said yes the first time.

Sources: Ottawa Business Journal