Tell us about one of your favorite neighborhoods in Detroit and what makes it unique?
My favorite neighborhood in Detroit happens to be the one I live in, the Art Center neighborhood. I live within walking distance of museums that attract people from all over the state to see the history and culture kept within this neighborhood.

Tell us about the challenge project you’re working on now and what you’re learning from the experience.
We just have just completed our second challenge with Slow Roll where our objective was to design a nonprofit village concept that will be executed at six 2018 Slow Roll events and build awareness of many nonprofits during the Slow Roll season. We were expected to build awareness about the organizations through the physical design and programming of the village event experience. In this project, I took on the role of team lead which gave me the opportunity to organize and lead a very talented group of people. In this role, I learned when to push the group and when to be more relaxed which allowed us to produce a group of quality deliverables. I am definitely looking forward to another opportunity to be a team lead because I found the experience to be very rewarding.

Tell us about your host company and your role in the organization.
My host company is the DTE Energy Foundation where I work as a financial analyst. I enjoy my time working for the Foundation, my coworkers and superiors are invested in my professional growth and take the time to teach me transferable skills that will be valuable to me after my time with Challenge Detroit is through.

We recently asked the DTE Energy Foundation to tell us a bit about the value that her work is adding to the organization:

Danielle is monitoring and providing reports on DTE Energy Foundation spend, in order to aid in management decision making. In addition, she prepares financial process documentation so tasks are standardized and has developed a new user-friendly budget model to track spending. Finally, Danielle provides much-needed support for our continuous improvement initiatives with a focus on developing more efficient and effective processes. – Shannon Johnson, DTE Energy Foundation

How do you hope to have an impact at your host company and within the city of Detroit?

A big focus at DTE Energy is to be continually improving your work process. I hope to improve the work processes that I have taken over and to make my role within the Foundation more efficient. I would like to carry over the idea of continuous improvement into the work I do within the city.

 

You are halfway through your Fellowship year, what experience has been most rewarding and what experience? 
The most rewarding experience has been being able to work with my fellow fellows. Our cohort is diverse in educational backgrounds and there is something to learn from everyone, my weaknesses are another person’s strength. This is a wonderful

opportunity to make myself a more well-rounded individual and employee.

How do you believe your fellowship will shape your career moving forward?This fellowship has helped me decide what my next career step will be. Going into this program I was not sure what the right career path would be for me, I was hoping to find some clarity. This fellowship has given me a great platform to jump from, while also creating a network of past, current and future Fellows.

To learn even more about Danielle’s experience, check out her spotlight video!