Increasing diversity in finance
Erika Casillas
Age: 31
Title: Finance Lead
Organization: AbbVie/President of ALPFA
Erika Casillas grew up in the Chicagoland suburbs along with her two younger sisters. Her parents migrated from the Mexican states of Michoacan and Guerrero in their early teens. Casillas was the first in her family to attend a four-year university. After her graduation from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2014 with a bachelor’s degree in accountancy and in 2015 with a master’s degree in accountancy, she began her career at Ernst & Young within the financial service office providing assurance, and then moved to AbbVie.
Casillas currently works within corporate finance at AbbVie, doing financial planning and analysis and helping her team accomplish key goals. Additionally, Casillas works to make an impact within AbbVie’s diversity and inclusion efforts by serving on the Latinx employee resource group and with campus recruiting efforts. As a result, she was named equity, diversity and inclusion champion on her team and shared her experiences and impact with others companywide.
Casillas is passionate about giving back to her community. She currently serves as president for the Chicago chapter of the Association of Latino Professionals for America. In this role she has focused on empowering the Latinx community in Chicago and empowering small business owners. Casillas leads a board of 20 people, and together they help students, professionals, and the community overall. Casillas led the Chicago ALPFA chapter to be recognized at a national level. Casillas was also recognized as a 2022 Rising Star by ALPFA Nationals.
Casillas hopes to continue growing her career while breaking barriers in corporate America to make way for the Latinx professionals who will come after her.
Words of wisdom: As we continue to trail blaze the spaces that were not made for us, let us not forget to thank those who came before us and continue to bring others along with us.
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