Joyce A. Murphy, MPA, executive vice chancellor of UMass Medical School’s Commonwealth Medicine division, has been named one of six Outstanding Women in Business by Worcester Business Journal.
“Any one of the six 2015 Outstanding Women in Business is amazing in her own right, but the combined force of this class presents a vast array of lessons and insights for men and women of all ages looking to succeed in their professional and personal lives,” Brad Kane, editor of Worcester Business Journal, said in the Oct. 26 article.
This is the seventh year for the Outstanding Women in Business awards, given “to a class of worthy women making a difference in business and the community,” Kane said.
Murphy was honored for her work in Central Massachusetts health care and for advocating for the underserved, part of the mission of Commonwealth Medicine, the health care consulting division of UMass Medical School. The awards will be presented at Worcester Business Journal’s annual luncheon Nov. 13 at Tuckerman Hall in Worcester.
“She (Murphy) is one of the most optimistic people I have ever met. She is part Mother Teresa and part Eleanor Roosevelt,” UMass Medical School Chancellor Michael F. Collins, MD, FACP, said in the article.
“There is no problem she has encountered that she hasn’t seen the solution to,” Dr. Collins said.
Murphy assumed the senior-most executive role at Commonwealth Medicine in 2011, five years after joining UMass Medical School as Commonwealth Medicine’s vice chancellor and chief operating officer. Previously, she held the positions of president and chief executive officer of Carney Hospital in Dorchester; founding president of St. Mary’s Center for Women and Children; vice president of St. Margaret’s Hospital for Women; first deputy commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Revenue; and superintendent of Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Framingham, the only women’s prison in Massachusetts.
She serves on numerous boards and commissions, including the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission Advisory Council and Massachusetts State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg’s Advisory Committee on Wage Equality. She is vice chair of the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Board of Directors. Murphy also sits on the boards of Curry College, UHealthSolutions and the Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare.