Meet Natasha Erskine
Natasha Erskine is the employee benefit plan practice leader and an assurance partner in Calvetti Ferguson’s Houston office. She has over two decades of public accounting and has been with the firm close to a decade. Natasha specializes in audits of employee benefit plans and providing consulting services relating to compliance with U.S. Department of Labor requirements and IRS regulations.
How did you know you wanted to work in employee benefit plans?
“I fell into it. I graduated college, and my first ever audit in public accounting was an employee benefit audit. From there, I immediately gravitated toward it, and the feeling of helping employees save for retirement was extremely fulfilling. It was very impactful for me to find a small error in a 401k plan in the testing that I was doing and know that fixing it could make a huge difference in an employee’s retirement fund later on.”
What is your favorite aspect of specializing in employee benefit plans?
“My favorite aspect about working in employee benefit plans is that it is industry agnostic. As the workforce ages and more and more employees cannot retire at the normal retirement age, it leads to several problems in a business. We help our clients establish and maintain healthy and well-structured retirement plans. I enjoy solving problems and offering up solutions to our client’s needs so that their business can continue to grow and prosper.
What do you like most about the culture at Calvetti Ferguson?
“I love the openness, especially in the sense of sharing ideas. Public accounting tends to be cutthroat nature, but that is not the case at Calvetti Ferguson. Leadership is accepting and seeks input from all levels. It is great being on a team that can grow together throughout the years in a collaborative environment.”
What is your definition of success?
“I grew up playing competitive sports and lettered in three sports in high school. When I was seven years old, I set a goal to obtain a scholarship to play softball. Not just any scholarship, I wanted to play for the best, and that was at Texas A&M University. It was a lofty goal, but years of hard work and dedication paid off. I was awarded a softball scholarship and played at A&M.
My definition of success is setting goals for yourself and then putting in the work to achieve your goals. Sports taught me that no matter what obstacles get in your way, you can overcome them with grit and determination. The same principles hold true in the business world.”