Founder & CEO
With over 20 years of experience across government, donor, private, and civil society sectors, Mai leads strategic initiatives that advance inclusive governance, gender equality, citizen engagement, and institutional reform. Her expertise spans public sector diagnostics, gender mainstreaming, social inclusion, MEL, participatory policy design, and organizational capacity strengthening.
Mai currently serves as a consultant to the World Bank, supporting their programming in Jordan on gender-based violence (GBV), sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment (SEA/SH), and social risk management. She contributes to social impact and risk analyses for Programs for Results (PforR) loans, working closely with government counterparts to align national systems with international environmental and social standards.
From 2018 to 2022, Mai served as the senior advisor leading the Open Government Unit at the Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation (MoPIC) in Jordan. In this capacity, she coordinated the design and implementation of Jordan’s 4th and 5th Open Government National Action Plans (2018–2020, 2021–2025), helping to institutionalize transparency, public participation, and stakeholder engagement across 11 ministries.
She is an active member of several high-level advisory bodies, including the World Bank Group’s Expert Advisory Council on Citizen Engagement, the Expert Hub on AML/CFT for NPOs, the Global CSO Coalition on Human Rights and Counterterrorism, the Jordan Economic Forum, and the Women Professionals and Business Association. She also serves on the boards of the Refugee, Displaced and Forced Migration Studies Centre (RDFMSC) at Yarmouk University and the Women’s Studies Centre at the University of Jordan.
Mai is widely recognized for her dedication to empowering women and civil society across the region. She co-founded Al-Hayat Center – RASED in 2006, where she led initiatives on social accountability, youth and women’s empowerment, and civic engagement for 14 years. Her training and advisory work has helped build the capacity of hundreds of NGOs, youth leaders, and women-led initiatives throughout the MENA region.
She holds a Master’s in Major Programme Management from the University of Oxford (Said Business School), where she was a Women’s Scholarship recipient and school ambassador. Mai is currently pursuing her PhD in Development Studies at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex, UK.
She is also certified in Gender Auditing and Monitoring & Evaluation by the International Labour Organization (ILO), and in Environmental and Social Framework (ESF) standards by the World Bank.