Matthew Taylor joined the RSA as their Chief Executive. Prior to this he worked at 10 Downing Street as a senior counsel on policy and chief adviser on political strategy to Prime Minister Tony Blair. Between 1999 and 2003 he was Director of the Institute for Public Policy Research, Britain’s leading centre left think tank.

What excited me about the RSA was the potential that existed in such a diverse organisation. It seemed to contain, all in one place, most of the challenges that I had been involved with in the past: running a think tank, mobilising a membership, developing an activist network and achieving organisational transformation. It has been incredibly hard work, which I think is at last paying off.

The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) has been a cradle of enlightenment thinking for over 250 years. Dedicated to removing the barriers to social progress, it adopts a multi-disciplinary, politically independent approach that combines cutting-edge research and policy development with practical action. It organises its work around five manifesto challenges of enterprise, environment, education, communities and citizenship, and encourages public discourse and critical debate by providing platforms for leading experts to share new ideas on contemporary issues.