Rathini Mahendran
Rathini is a collaborative and driven business case specialist consulting to Transport for NSW by coordinating a team of multi-disciplinary experts in a cross-matrix organisation to deliver a Final Business Case.
Prior to joining Iceni, Rathini offered her business case expertise to a major engineering firm where she led the development of business cases for Sydney Trains, Roads and Maritime and the Department of Education and performed financial and cost-benefit analyses, feasibility studies and analytics for clients.
Previously, as a member of the Investment Assurance Team within Transport NSW, she performed over 25 project assurance reviews, more than 20 of which were Gateway reviews as an Expert Panel Reviewer.
Here we put Rathini in the spotlight…
What has been your greatest achievement?
That’s a hard one! The one I can brag about most would be my category award prize in Geology and Planetary Geology for the VSSEC-NASA Space Prize in 2011. It put me in the running for the overall prize, which would have given me a fantastic opportunity to visit NASA.
As it is, I got to present my thesis at the 2011 Australian Space Science Conference in Canberra to a range of space physicists, geologists, biologists – you name it! It was an exciting time where I met incredible people.
Of course, there’s also the time I mastered roller skating, which isn’t easy either!
What’s your favourite city and why?
Gubbio, Italy. The city has centuries of history, an amazing feel, and is perfect for thinking and artistic creation 🙂 The city is on a mountain slope, and just wandering the hilly pathways gives you amazing views wherever you go.
What is your go-to professional development book?
The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People focuses on core values, and runs the gamut from time management to communication and collaboration, so it’s a good classic for anyone. I’m partial to Edward De Bono as well.
Who would be your 3 dream dinner party guests and why?
Numero uno – Terry Pratchett! With his brilliant mind and great sense of humour, how can any dinner party go wrong?
Number 2 – Adele, who I would love to take a singing lesson from.
Number 3 – Susan Scott, who spent a significant part of her career working with CEOs from all kinds of businesses. I’d love to hear more of her stories and insights
What are your future predictions for how we will work and live?
I think we’ll definitely be more flexible with the advent and refinement of more mobile working and virtual workspace technologies. I don’t think the office will ever go out of fashion though – no matter how much of a gig-economy we become, humans are social creatures, and physical workspaces will always hold a social aspect that Skype and Facetime can’t quite imitate.
I look forward to when we have personal teleportation devices to cut down our commutes!
