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Julie DeSantis' early trip to Europe helped inspire a career

Posted On: Apr. 15, 2012 12:00 AM CST

Julie DeSantis' early trip to Europe helped inspire a career

On a school trip to Europe that brought her to London at age 14, Julie DeSantis saw the Lloyd's of London building from the tour bus and thought, “I want to work there one day.”

Nearly 20 years later in 2004, that dream was realized when Ms. DeSantis, vp, risk management for Sony Corp. of America, attended her first meeting in the Lloyd's building.

Born in Cranston, R.I., Ms. DeSantis attended Bryant University in Smithfield, R.I., earning a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration.

While finishing her third year at Bryant, Ms. DeSantis took a temporary position with the risk management and legal department at the Providence Journal-Bulletin broadcasting and newspaper publishing company, handling day-to-day administration, certificates of insurance and contract reviews. She became a full-time employee in 1993.

“I was so lucky that I had that opportunity in college,” she said. “I am truly a math nerd. But what I liked about the risk management department was...you were out there actually getting to meet with other departments and learn more about what they worked on, their risk, their exposures, and how could you help them.”

In 1994, Ms. DeSantis became the assistant risk manager at Nortek Inc. in Providence, R.I., where she developed the philosophy that if she were to change employers, she must attain more risk management experience than in her previous position.

“If I was missing some core fundamental principle in risk management, or some task, or some responsibility, I better hope that I had that at the next job,” she said.

Following that philosophy, Ms. DeSantis moved through career roles at Panasonic Corp. of North America, Mitsubishi International Corp. and KMC Telecom Holdings Inc., with ever-increasing responsibilities, experience and breadth as a risk practitioner.

In 2003, Ms. DeSantis joined Sony with responsibility and design of the company's global insurance programs.

Ms. DeSantis, 41, lives in Nutley, N.J., with her husband, Vincent, and son, Alexander, who will turn 3 in June.