In this week’s Fellow Spotlight, we are checking in with Rosemary Williamson. She fills us in on what she enjoys most about living in the city, and her host company, Chrysler!

Rosie, you grew up in Summit, New Jersey, and attended Michigan State University. After graduating college what drew you back to Michigan, and specifically Detroit?

While earning my undergraduate degree at MSU, I was fortunate to have had many opportunities in the classroom where I was introduced to Detroit. As an out of state student, I wanted to connect with my peers and try to understand their perspective living in Michigan. After returning home I felt like I started to identify more with Michigan, less with the east coast, and I really wanted to continue exploring that. Moving to Detroit has been wonderful and I couldn’t be happier living and working here.

What do you enjoy most about living in Detroit?

I really enjoy the energy around all things local. Buying local produce, supporting local businesses, working locally either in Detroit or in the Metro Detroit cities, volunteering for local initiatives, attending city wide events – this is something I’ve never actively supported and it feels good to have that mentality in the forefront. I buy my groceries in Eastern Market, I dine out with coworkers and friends at local Detroit hotspots, get my hair cut down the street, and walk to work. For a city as big as Detroit, there is so much opportunity to live this way, and after four months I’ve been very successful and satisfied.

Tell us about your host company, and what you do?

I work with Chrysler on the Sales and Marketing side of the business in the Great Lakes Business Center, which takes up residency in Chrysler House, aka the old Dime Building, on Griswold in Downtown Detroit. I am fortunate that I have been exposed to responsibility in multiple departments within the office. Currently I work in Field Operations where I communicate all types of information and generate reports to our field team. I also contribute to the Supply Chain/Distribution team during allocation runs. My office is very busy and operates like a well-oiled machine; it’s an exciting and passionate company to work for. I really couldn’t have asked for a better experience.

What makes working for Chrysler unique?

This market, though domestic, is somewhat foreign to me. Before I started working at Chrysler, I was researching the business and watching commercials as much as I could before walking in the door to familiarize myself with our product. And though some of it was useful, this job is tough. It tests my math skills more than any college math course I was enrolled in, keeps me on my toes, requires multitasking while remaining flexible, among many other things. But the chase is exciting and my coworkers and bosses are so smart and give 150% everyday; it’s amazing and I love it. It is very challenging working in the Great Lakes Business Center, but very rewarding. I’m lucky to have clicked the box in April that I would like to have the opportunity to interview with Chrysler for no reason other than it was a big company and I wanted that experience. I’m working my butt off in this unique downtown office and I love it.

What have you enjoyed most about the Challenges thus far?

I am lucky to have been assigned to teams that coincidentally fit my skill set quite well. The deliverables for our non-profit partners have been very artistic and creative including event planning, video storyboarding, and video editing. I have always enjoyed video editing, but now it’s like a treat when I get to create something extra for our non-profit partners. It’s nice to change gears after a busy workday with Chrysler, to work on challenges where I use a completely different set of skills. However, I am hoping to branch outside of my comfort zone in future challenges because there is still so much I want to learn from my fellow fellows. This group is very exciting to work with and I want to make sure I utilize this unique opportunity in professional exchange before the year comes to a close.

Check out Rosemary’s personal blog here, and her spotlight video.