Basmah Al Mayman was born and raised in Saudi Arabia. She studied at King Saud University and has a BA in English Literature and Linguistics and an MBA from Alfaisal University. Basmah started in her present post in 2018, making history as the first Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) national and the first female to head the GCC for the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). She outpaced hundreds of other candidates from around the globe. Basmah is the first Arab female to hold the Middle East Regional Director position of the UNWTO. In addition, since the organization's founding more than three decades ago, she is the first person from a member of the GCC to hold that position. In 2020, the World Bank named her one of the region's youngest CEOs.

Basmah flourished in her sector and have founded the World Tourism Academy in Saudi Arabia the same year, working with the UNWTO. Basmah is also a founding member of the Program and Budget Committee of the Executive Council for the Middle East and a member of the Board of Directors of the Sustainable Tourism for Eliminating Poverty (ST-EP) initiative of the UNWTO. She was a founder member and later a board member of the Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heritage (SCTH). She has served as the official Saudi focal point for the UNWTO and other international organizations since 2013.

In an effort to empower women and promote gender equality and equal opportunities in the industry, she recently (2023) held workshops in Jordan with the minister of tourism.

She has won multiple awards and is currently ranked 79 on Forbes Middle East's "power list" of one hundred successful businesswomen.