'Frankly, all knees were shaking': the Steady Eddies on the board helped me through the crisis.

• Author: Boni, Peter J.
• Position: ENDNOTE

Peter J. Boni has served as a CEO, Fortune 500 executive, consultant, director, and venture capitalist. Add authorXo that list. He has just written a leadership primer, All Hands on Deck: Navigating Your Team Through Crises, Getting Your Organization Unstuck, and Emerging Victorious, published by Career Press Inc. (www. careerpress.com). The book includes a case study of the turnaround of Safeguard Scientifics Inc., a six-decades-old NYSE holding company whose main business is incubating a portfolio of innovative science and technology firms (what Boni calls Partner Companies) for eventual acquisition or IPO opportunities. He was recruited to be Safeguard's CEO in 2005 and retired from that role in 2013. He and his team successfully repositioned the company after the burst of the Internet bubble and guided it through the financial market upheaval that jolted the world three years into his tenure. The market turmoil certainly jolted corporate boardrooms, including Safeguard's, as he recounts in the following excerpt from his book (copyright 2015 by Peter J. Boni).

--James Kristie

Nothing prepared any of us for the financial crisis and resulting credit crunch that hit global markets in 2008-2009. What a land mine that put to the test all of our Socratic resolve. Napoleon defined a military genius as "a man who can do the average when all around him are going crazy." That sums up what was happening!

Safeguard's management team navigated this complexity, stayed focused on its goals, thought creatively, and stood toe to toe to overcome so many obstacles during this global meltdown. It was a scary time for everyone. We guided our Partner Companies to: conserve cash; operate aggressively and predatorily to gain and hold customers; and seek accretive, cashless acquisitions to take out weaker competitors.

We certainly needed to give each other a morale boost from time to time. My public company CEO circle all said the same thing: their boardroom relationships and decision making experienced the stress and uncertainty of a potential cash crisis and a deteriorating stock value. Add to that fears of shareholder lawsuits. Times were tense.

Safeguard's outside board of directors was comprised of an experienced group with diverse skills. Its members had both operating and financial backgrounds. Their ages ranged from a low of 55 to a high of 74. Holding seats were former science and technology CEOs and CFOs (three of each), a Big 8 audit partner, an...