Inez Murray was appointed chief executive officer by the Financial Alliance for Women’s board of directors in November 2012. As CEO, Inez, who had previously served the Alliance as Vice Chair of the board, is responsible for setting the strategic direction, implementing the board’s vision, and overseeing the Alliance’s day-to-day operations. She is a globally recognized expert in women’s economic empowerment, speaking and publishing widely on that topic, and is also a seasoned executive with nearly 20 years’ experience running complex global projects, incubating new initiatives, and raising more than $20 million in funding from public and private sources.
Inez comes to the Financial Alliance for Women following a 17-year career with Women’s World Banking. The world’s largest network of microfinance institutions, WWB reaches more than 26 million low-income people, the vast majority of them women, with quality financial services. As WWB’s Executive Vice President, Inez was responsible for all aspects of WWB’s technical assistance practice group. Her division served WWB’s global network of 39 financial institutions with research and development, marketing strategies, and roll out of innovative microfinance products while integrating financial education and mobile technology. Her team also offered leadership development for senior staff of the microfinance sector through WWB’s Center for Microfinance Leadership and worked to keep the microfinance sector focused on the mission of empowering women through initiatives such as the development of key performance indicators to better target and impact low-income women.
Inez’s earlier career with WWB included positions heading the microfinance products team, developing WWB’s strong practice in savings services for women and youth, and heading the consumer research unit which she had founded and which significantly contributed to the understanding, on the part of both the WWB network members and the sector as a whole, into women’s financial behaviors and preferences. She also pioneered an innovative business development service called Servimicros which channeled large numbers of entrepreneurs from the sewn goods manufacturing sector towards a select group of suppliers, thereby allowing the entrepreneurs to negotiate supplies at a significant discount.
Inez worked as a senior consultant in the strategy practice of Booz Allen Hamilton in New York before joining WWB in 1996. She has also worked on consultancies for a range of clients in the microfinance sector and is an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.
An Irish national, Inez received her undergraduate degree in economics and business from Trinity College, Dublin. She also holds a master’s in economics and political development from Columbia University and a diploma in advanced management from the Wharton Business School of the University of Pennsylvania.