As CEO of MiSide, Sean de Four Helps Communities Reach Their Greatest Potential

When Sean de Four was in college, he volunteered for a service-learning program to support creative writing workshops and debate clubs at a few Michigan prisons. At the time, he was pursuing a bachelor’s degree in political science — and his experiences inspired him to go on to achieve a Master of Social Work degree.

“At that point, I wasn’t sure where my career would go. I could feel myself moving toward a social impact career,” recalls de Four. “I was a young Black man in college and the reality was that the majority of the men I was working with in the prisons looked just like me. They were just as smart and talented, but because they didn’t have the same opportunities, or maybe just a small difference in circumstances there was that divergence between my life and theirs. At that moment, I committed myself to a career in helping people. Of making it so that people do not have their potential stifled by their circumstances.”

As the new president and CEO of MiSide — the community impact network formed when Southwest Solutions and Development Centers merged — de Four puts his MSW background to good use to help MiSide fulfill its mission to provide Wayne County communities with equitable access to health, education and self-sufficiency opportunities. Previously, de Four served in C-suite positions at several nonprofit human services organizations, and most recently served as CEO of Southwest Solutions.

With the combined strength, MiSide is better positioned to support individuals in Wayne County, de Four says, adding that MiSide serves 22,000-25,000 individuals annually.

De Four shares that all the things that made the two individual organizations that formed MiSide great are still there. “Those aren’t changing,” he says. “The names of these long legacy organizations may have changed, but the DNA is still the same. We look forward to having an even greater impact, and hopefully having the same support we enjoyed separately.”

Merging to serve communities even better

As a community impact network, MiSide offers four distinct resources: MiHousing, MiEarly Years, MiWealth and MiHealth — providing access to all of the things individuals, families and communities need across the lifespan. Within each of these divisions lie adult education, homebuying services, workforce development, early childhood programs, homeless services, behavioral health services, youth and family services — and so much more.

Prior to merging, Southwest Solutions and Development Centers had a longstanding partnership, says de Four. “For close to 20 years, there were a variety of joint ventures and collaborations in the community, and there was always a good relationship and close partnership,” he says.

Several factors prompted the move, de Four says. Catherine Liesman, longtime CEO of Development Centers, was considering retirement and wanted to explore what was best for the organization’s mission to sustain the work it had started.

Advocacy work surrounding a 2021 bill introduced to the Michigan legislature brought the two organizations closer together. “The bill would have changed how the public mental health system was funded and administered,” explains de Four. “We thought about what the organizations needed to look like for their missions to continue for 50 years and not just five years. It was then that we started talking seriously about whether it made sense to combine and become one,” de Four says.

What followed was an 18-month review process to investigate the merger. “We brought the boards together to explore, and the more we talked and learned, the more we felt that it made sense,” he says.

Helping individuals build generational wealth

De Four says he has four distinct goals for MiSide. First, to provide a comprehensive set of services to offer clients, making MiSide unique in that it focuses on the whole person. “Not a lot of organizations do all of these things in key areas,” he says. Second, he leans on an improved infrastructure, with better HR, IT and finance entities as a bigger, combined organization. A third goal is influence. “When we looked at our size, our geographic footprint of where our offices are located, we know we have a bigger voice and are better positioned to support the community,” says de Four.

Finally, he says, MiSide’s services address all the social determinants of health, which is unique within nonprofits. “The communities of Brightmoore, Southwest Detroit,and Cody Rouge are areas where we can have a measurable impact precisely because we cover all of the social determinants of health.”

De Four is confident that MiSide can help individuals reach opportunities to build generational wealth — the area of the biggest potential for Wayne County residents.

“When we can bring a housing program forward, we have seen the effects of housing as a catalyst for redevelopment in an entire community. We have seen this in Southwest Detroit. When there are great, affordable housing products in disinvested areas, that brings a spark in private development and resurgence,” he says. “MiSide’s homeownership programs work with residents to transition from renters to owners within their own communities, and that is an asset to build generational wealth.”

This component, combined with MiSide’s health and social supports, brings individuals living on the edge of poverty the skills and tools they need, says de Four. “Wrap all of that together, and we are helping people have the ability to really transform their communities so residents can own a piece of their communities when they couldn’t before. That’s their biggest potential.”

Learn more about MiSide. Visit miside.org.