Meet Chelsea Wheeler, a Senior Trainer at Rocket Central who has been working at Rocket Companies for over four years. Chelsea is passionate about volunteering, especially when it overlaps with her other passion, professional development. Chelsea calls this intersection, “feeding two birds with one scone,” because it enables her to make a positive impact in the community while having fun helping others advance their professional skills. “I have found several volunteer opportunities that help me build and flex skills that I use at work and at home while also positively impacting the life and careers of others,” she said. “And I love helping my teammates discover this connection too!”
Empowering Others At Work
Chelsea likes the flexibility and virtual aspect of Empower Work, but she also enjoys participating in other volunteer opportunities with our nonprofit partners – especially when her team gets involved. “We do at least one outing a quarter, and it always fun to get out of the office and do something together,” she said. Her team has volunteered together at food banks like Forgotten Harvest and Gleaners Community Food Bank, where they packed food for families in the community, and Arts & Scraps, a popular opportunity where volunteers pack art kits, prepare materials, and collect items to be reused for art projects. Chelsea and her team have also been able to engage with the community remotely through a group volunteer opportunity with our Resident Connection Hub, a call center which provides Detroit residents with information about critical resources. These experiences proved especially helpful during the pandemic, when our in-person events were canceled due to health and safety reasons. As Chelsea mentioned, regardless of whether its virtual or in-person, group volunteering is a great way for team members to bond with each other while making a positive impact in the community.
One of Chelsea’s biggest motivators for volunteering as much as possible was our Dollars for Doers program, which rewards team members who volunteer a certain number of hours with grants they can donate to a nonprofit of their choice. “Ever since I joined the company in 2019, I have contributed the max amount to organizations that are important to me,” she said. And this is exactly why the Dollars for Doers program is so important to our team members – it empowers them to volunteer, since they can double their impact by receiving funds to further support the organizations they love.
Thanks to team members like Chelsea, our nonprofit partners are always supported by passionate individuals who are dedicated to making a positive difference.
