"When I think of the best teams I have worked with, the one that managed Unum’s balance sheet during the Credit Crisis in 2008 and 2009 is at the top. Around one table, everyone was an expert in some part of Unum’s financial situation, and I had the good fortune to manage this team. We had a solid framework for understanding the business, experience with crisis, commitment to risk management and sensitivity to all our stakeholders. Together, we created a consensus to lean into the crisis, borrowing to buy at a time when our peers were selling. This team’s decisions are still paying off for Unum’s shareholders."

From 1994 to 2010, Unum was one of the headline turnaround and growth stories in the Fortune 500. Frank Williamson was part of it for 15 years.

From 1995 to 2010, Frank was the company’s internal investment banker. He was responsible for more than $7 billion in financing transactions, numerous M&A transactions and a $40 billion investment portfolio. He joined Provident Life & Accident as assistant to the CFO in 1995 and coordinated the acquisition of Paul Revere Life Insurance, including the strategic and private equity investments that financed the transaction. He helped managed the integration of Provident & Paul Revere and returned to a similar assignment after the Provident and Unum merger in 2000.

During the early 2000’s recession, Frank managed underwriting and insurance pricing for Unum and coordinated the restructuring of the company’s balance sheet and the response to an activist investor in the wake of this recession. Beginning in 2006, he headed strategic planning, corporate development and capital management, and in 2008, he added responsibility for Unum’s investment department.

Frank also served as an officer of the Portland Stage Company through a financial transition; COO of Vets First Choice during a triple-the-company merger; and trustee of the Tennessee Aquarium as it embarked on a new phase of growth. Frank earned an early appreciation for risk management getting his hands dirty on the South Carolina tobacco farm where he grew up. Farming is an inherently risky activity where a crop makes or not by the end of the season, and weather and insects are more in God’s hands than a farmer’s.

"The lesson of my career is that mergers and refinancings are always risky. The best deal people see the whole picture, are sensitive to all the risks and maintain a healthy but controlled appetite for taking risk. The FourBridges team is right there with my Credit Crisis-era colleagues at Unum: they have the expertise, experience and commitment to risk management that creates lasting success when the fog of a deal clears. I believe that for FourBridges clients, acquire, grow, merge and thrive really can go together."