Sixcia Devine

AGE: 31
POSITION: Providence Metro regional director, R.I. Small Business Development Center; President, HDSC LLC
RESIDENCE: Providence
LIFELONG AMBITION: Wouldn’t say
FAVORITE BOOK: “Sofie’s World,” by Jostein Gaarder
GUILTY PLEASURE: Wouldn’t say
Sixcia Devine bridges two worlds every day.
As a Dominican-American and Providence Metro regional director for the R.I. Small Business Development Center at Johnson & Wales University, she is an invaluable resource to people in the community who are trying to build a future for themselves in business, often with little money, few English skills and no connections to the mainstream financial world.
As an entrepreneur, co-owner of HDSC LLC and creator of the SpeakNow! Spanish Programs for business executives, she’s an invaluable resource to people who may have all the right connections at the top, but need help reaching the Latino community.
Devine is happy to help both, and she switches back and forth with ease, spending the day providing business counseling, help with technology and whatever else her SBDC clients may need, then hosting a fabulous multicultural party for her SpeakNow! clients, complete with artists’ presentations, live music and dancing.
On the side – because after all, with two jobs, she still has a few minutes left every day – she gives talks at local high schools, and she has served on the boards of the Girl Scouts of America and the Providence Latin American Film Festival, among other activities.
Before joining the SBDC, Devine was the training and development specialist at the Center for Women & Enterprise in Providence, and in that capacity, she won the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Women In Business Champion award.
This year, she also won the Young Professional of the Year award from Rhode Island Young Professionals. She has been honored by the Met School for her volunteer work, and she is part of the current Leadership Rhode Island class.
So who inspires her? Her grandmother, Devine wrote in her 40 Under Forty application.
“Her guidance and support led me to the most influential experience of my life,” she said, “which was helping women start and grow businesses.”