Finance/Insurance: ALBERTO SCHIAVON

Not to be confused with the Italian Olympic snowboarder, Schiavon has led Elephant Auto Insurance since 2017.

As a student at the University of Padova in his native Italy, Schiavon studied engineering. Unfortunately, he graduated in 2007 during the Great Recession, he told Authority magazine, at a time when seemingly no one needed another engineer.

After working a bit, Schiavon went to the University of Manchester in England for an MBA. He then started work at Elephant’s parent company, the Admiral Group, as an international pricing manager.

Five years later, the company shipped Schiavon to Richmond to work at Elephant as head of marketing and pricing for eight months, before making him CEO.

In the annual report for Elephant’s parent company, British financial services company Admiral Group plc, Schiavon described 2021 as a mixed year for Elephant, which insures consumers in eight states and has 516 employees in Virginia. At the end of 2021, the company insured 228,700 vehicles, a 10% increase over 2020. Nonetheless, Elephant reported a loss of about $15.5 million for the year.

WHAT I WAS LIKE IN HIGH SCHOOL: I was a classic example of a nerd. For all the nerds out there, life can get better.