Richard is a research scientist with extensive experience working in, and with, science and science-policy agencies in the Australian government. He has worked in environmental, agricultural and forestry agencies developing several national initiatives and frameworks involving state and territory governments, universities and NGOs and land managers. These initiatives include: being an instrumental player in the development of the National Reserve Systems (terrestrial and marine); establishing the framework for developing the National Vegetation Information System; contributing to the development of national approaches for tracking change and trend in native vegetation condition and land cover dynamics.

He has held/holds various honorary positions at several universities: 2016-20 Visiting Fellow and then Adjunct Associate Professor, Fenner School of Environment and Society, Australian National University, Canberra; 2016-21 Visiting Fellow and then Visiting Lecturer, School of Physical, Environmental and Mathematical Sciences (PEMS) University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy and 2016-18 Visiting Fellow and then Adjunct Associate Professor, the University of Queensland.

Richard's research involves assessing the transformation of ecosystems and landscapes due to the effect that changes in land use, land management regimes and practices have on ecological criteria and indicators including function, structure and composition.

His research aims to assist decision makers improve their ability to monitor and report on the status, and to track and change and trend in environmental condition arising from deliberate and inadvertent land management practices and regimes. A focus of his current research involves evaluating regenerative landscape management regimes. His research supports land managers and decision makers to develop systems to track change and trend in ecological outcomes. Systems include developing response indicators and documenting soil-landscape management chronologies which are integral to understanding landscape transformation. Remote sensing is fundamental to upscaling ground-based measures and observations.