Richard Cawley

What is your role at Ricardo?
I work as an Associate Director as part of the Water practice based in Adelaide, with a focus on water industry regulatory advice and support.

What does your average day at Ricardo look like? 
Most days are spent in the office in Adelaide. My main focus is providing support and advice for clients on strategy, economic regulation, and commercial decisions. The have a small team who I work with directly, but Ricardo operates a very flexible approach and I work with different team members depending upon the expertise required for each contract. I am currently supporting other teams on the Strategy Refresh Project for the ENOWA water utility based in NEOM.

I am currently working with the SA Government Dept for Environment and Water of an alternative water supply for the Barossa Valley wine region, supporting Sydney Water for the development of their 2024 Pricing Submission and working with the Tasmanian water utility, Taswater, on the development of a capital prioritisation framework.

What do you look forward to at work? 
I enjoy learning new things, which I seem to do every day at RII, helping clients, and working as part of a team.

What do you find most rewarding at work? / Are you proud to work at Ricardo?
The most rewarding element is working on projects that I can make a wider difference, such as working with the state government to develop a water security policy to ensure remote communities get a reliable water supply and working with clients of new ways of working.

What was your team’s latest achievement and how was it celebrated?
As we are a small office we tend to celebrate together on achievements, not just at a team level. We have morning teas to celebrate work wins and personal achievements. Last week we won our first ever contract with Sydney Water, the largest utility in Australia, and so we will need to celebrate that success.

How have you developed your career at Ricardo? 
I had an established career before joining Ricardo, but I am still learning and upping my skills and knowledge by working on new projects and in new sectors such as mining. I am also keen to learn from Ricardo’s expertise in Net Zero.

How do you support career development opportunities for your team?
I currently have a very small team and we will be looking to develop together over the next few years. This is an opportunity for the team to gain more experience and expertise in pricing and economic regulation, strategy development, and developing project business case. We also give people the opportunity to work and across teams and gain new skills and I am excited that we will have new team members joining us form the UK water business in 2024.

What do you most enjoy about working with your team?
I enjoy the bringing together of different skills and experience, and how that helps in the forming of news ways of approaching old problems.

What opportunities do you have at Ricardo to share your knowledge or expertise?
I have expertise in economic regulation, particularly for the water sector. By working with my direct team and the wider team on regulatory project I am seeking to nurture this know more widely across Ricardo. There also exist the opportunity to work with Ricardo teams in other geographies to expand our corporate knowledge.

What advice would you give to anyone considering a career like yours? 
I can share the advice a mentor gave me when I first moved into consulting, it’s not just the network you are doing today which will win you work but the trust that you have developed over the years of opening engaging with people and supporting them, whether they were a client or not.