Zanoni Brought Surplus of Experience to Work

In today’s world of moving from one job to another, few individuals can call a business home for the last 42-and-a-half years. Deanna Marie Zanoni can do just that.

To put time in perspective, when Zanoni, was hired as a clerk by the Surplus Line Association of California, John F. Kennedy was residing in the White House.

From 1961 through 1965, Zanoni worked in the Data Processing Department. In 1962, she produced the “Review of Alien Non-Admitted Insurers,” by calculating alien company financial data into U.S. dollars. Eventually, Zanoni conducted the financial analysis of the domestic and alien non-admitted companies for all the California requirements and supplied statistical reports to the California Department of Insurance (CDI).

In later years, Zanoni’s job was to contact the surplus line brokers and conduct seminars on SLA filing procedures. From 1965 through 1975, she served as supervisor of the data processing department. In 1975 she became the office accountant in addition to supervisor of data processing. A year later, Zanoni became office manager in addition to being the office accountant.

Two decades later, Zanoni, who resides in Santa Rosa with her husband Ric, became director of the Stamping Office—a position in which she oversaw the SLA departments and internal functions. This includes the accounting functions, financial investments, preparing the annual budget, and monitoring SLA’s income and expenses, and planning SLA’s meetings and finally, providing guidance on surplus line regulation to brokers—a position she held through the end of July when she retired from the Association.

“Deanna will be sorely missed by the staff of the SLA and the surplus line broker community,” SLA executive director Ted Pierce remarked. “Deanna set an example for everyone with whom she worked through her strong work ethic, determination and dedication to career.”

For Zanoni, the changes over the years, including the advent of the Internet, were numerous.

“Computers for one were a big change,” Zanoni continued. “It is more challenging because we’re able to collect a lot more data today and create many more reports, sorting every which way. I was the first one to ever get a computer because I kept the books manually, that was some time in the 80s. I first thought ‘Oh my God.’ It is just like typing though and then you found out how much easier it was. I was there as all these different things came about. We never recorded any security, data back, SIC codes, name of insured, or information from the SL 1 & SL 2 forms back then. I have been through numerous rewrites of our computer system over the years. I was there when that program all came about. All we recorded when I came was a policy number, effective date, a premium, coverage codes and whether it was a new or renewal endorsement, that was it.”

Zanoni, who worked for seven different bosses over the decades, looks back on her years at the SLA with fondness, noting that traveling to the different conferences was a great part of the job.

When asked if she ever expected to be at the SLA for 42-and-a-half years, Zanoni replied, “I thought I might make it a year and it would look good on a resume.”

Topics California