Some of her previous occupations were education coordinator at Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, field director for the Pennsylvania-Yale Abydos North Cemetery Project, and curatorial assistant, Egyptian Section at University of Pennsylvania Museum.
Since 1995 Richards has directed the University of Michigan-sponsored Abydos Middle Cemetery Project, which focuses on the funerary remains of the Late and Ptolemaic periods.
One of Richards's most defining moments came in 1999 when the expedition located the lost tomb of Weni the Elder, the governor of Upper Egypt.
[2] Richards is the author of "Society and Death in Ancient Egypt: Mortuary Landscapes of the Middle Kingdom" (Cambridge, 2005).
She is also co-editor with Mary van Buren of “Order, Legitimacy and Wealth in Ancient States” (Richards 1-5).