Samantha Abeydeera has worked as a CEO, COO and MD, leading large, complex organisations across transport, operations and the not-for-profit sector.

Samantha has held several significant executive roles throughout her career, including leading one of Australia’s largest public transport providers with more than 3,000 employees delivering close to 50 million annual customer journeys across bus, ferry and e-mobility services. As Executive Director of Strategic Operations at Transport for NSW, she drove end-to-end multimodal strategy across a network facilitating up to 700 million annual customer journeys. She has also held senior private sector leadership roles at NRMA Group, including Managing Director of Transport and Chief Operating Officer for Maritime.

In 2018, Samantha was recognised as one of the Top 50 Women in NSW Government for her transformational leadership as Director of Train Crewing at Sydney Trains, where she led a team of more than a thousand drivers and guards, who delivered over 400 million customer journeys each year. Samantha holds a Bachelor of Commerce and a Bachelor of Laws from Macquarie University and has completed executive education at Harvard.