Richard joined The King's Fund in March 2009 to lead on social care, building on the achievements of the Caring Choices initiative and the Wanless review of social care funding. A graduate of the LSE, his professional background is social work, having worked in a variety of roles including Director of Social Services and Health Authority Chief Executive (the first combined post in England). From 2002 Richard worked for the Department of Health in helping to support the implementation of national health and social care policy; initially as Director of the Health and Social Care Change Agent Team and then Chief Executive of the Care Services Improvement Partnership (CSIP) until summer 2007.