Micah Kiel

Iowa philanthropy director, Wells Fargo

Age: 39

Mentor: Jose Solla, vice president, project management manager, Wells Fargo 

Reasons he is a Forty: Micah helped launch the Dogtown placemaking strategy. In collaboration with Invest DSM, Drake University, Dogtown small businesses and the Drake Neighborhood Association, they funded lighting systems that transformed the small business corridor during winter months. Micah received the Heroes for the Homeless award from Central Iowa Shelter and Services. He served as the chair for the Greater Des Moines Inclusion Council. Micah helped create flexible approaches to deliver more than $10 million in philanthropic funds to the state of Iowa during the pandemic. These funds helped address some of our communities’ greatest needs during the pandemic, such as homelessness, BIPOC small business support and food insecurity.  

What are your goals in your role at your company? Drive positive systemic impacts in the areas of housing affordability, financial health and small business growth, especially among Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC). 

What are your goals for your community involvement? I’m part of the CelebrAsian Hmong Village team, a small, important minority group, who migrated to the United States in the early 1970s as refugees from the Secret War. I’m excited to work with this community to bring greater awareness to the richness of the Hmong story and culture. 

What's your biggest passion, and why? People and strategy.

What is it that drives you? My desire to serve. I got involved in DEI work for the first time in 2004 conducting diversity training and camps with high school students. I attended the trainings as a camp counselor that afforded me the opportunity to confront my biases.

What are your future aspirations? I will be making a career change into the mental health field. My aspiration is to drive significant systemic change in mental health in the state of Iowa.

Three hobbies: My '65 Mustang, hiking at national parks, gardening and landscaping.

Fun fact: He is a bachata dancer and newly found gardening master, who loves to eat street tacos in the twilight. He is someone who can always be counted on for chips, diet pop and entertainment for those who enter his home. (This statement was written by individuals who know Micah very well.) 

One word to describe you: Deliberate.

What is your wish for the Central Iowa business community? My wish is having a regionwide vision and measurement tools for diversity, equity and inclusion. I support the work that the DSM 4 Equity Collective is doing to move our community in this direction.  

What's one piece of advice that you would give to a young professional? Listen. Find out what goodness means to the people you work with. 

What is one issue you would like to see Central Iowa leaders address? Mental health. Coming from a long line of health care professionals, there is a gap in access to and the quality of mental health care in Iowa, and minority populations are most affected by the treatment gap. Collaborative and joint care is a systemic, team-based approach to the management of mental health. We have work to do to continue to bring awareness, access and quality mental health services to our state.