Shatara Murphy

Shatara Murphy serves as a strategic leader, thought partner, project manager and collaborator to foster relationships with University and community-based stakeholders that advance the University’s role as an anchor in the region. Pivotal to her role, Shatara also supports the Buy, Build, Hire LOCAL program—Pitt’s commitment to hiring more of our neighbors, helping businesses grow, and awarding more construction, service and purchasing contracts across the region. Additionally, Shatara stewards Pitt’s housing affordability initiatives and its Walk to Work program and serves as a convener and resource partner to non-degree workforce development efforts across the University.

Prior to joining the University, Shatara served as the Community Health and Employee Engagement Programs Manager at Highmark Health. In this role, she led direct community health initiatives throughout the multi-billion-dollar organization’s footprint, leading company volunteerism and employee engagement programs in ten regions across four states.

Shatara previously served as the Deputy Director for the City of Pittsburgh’s Department of Public Safety Division of Community Affairs. This division, comprised of five offices with a focus on community and economic engagement strategies, was created after Murphy led an initiative to connect Public Safety’s focused deterrent model of policing—a combination of law enforcement, social services and community mobilization as a way to reduce crime—with additional programming, investment and capacity building strategies that keep residents at the center of what Public Safety does in a way that is positive and impactful.

Shatara received a Master of Business Administration from the Katz Graduate School of Business and a Bachelor of Science in Business Management from the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford. She serves as a board member of Pittsburgh Action Against Rape (PAAR) and is the president of the Pittsburgh chapter of the National Black MBA Association.