Riswandi is a lecturer at the Department of Development Economics, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universitas Syiah Kuala University. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Abdu Latif Jamil Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) from June 2023 to June 2024, working on climate change, energy, and the environment sector. His area of interest resides in the application of microeconomic theories to human capital accumulation.

Riswandi also served as a consultant to the Aceh Provincial Government, where he provided expertise in developing planning documents and progress reports on the education sector, poverty, and the rights of people with disability from 2010-2023. Before that, he worked with the Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Agency for Aceh and Nias, overseeing the implementation of reconstruction programs after the 2004 tsunami. Additionally, Riswandi served as a consultant to the World Bank, where he was actively involved in developing Aceh's public spending for reconstruction and poverty reduction in 2006.

Riswandi received a PhD in Economics from the Australian National University, where he investigated the long-term impacts of three adverse childhood experiences – malaria infection, tsunami exposure, and incomplete basic immunization – on educational and health outcomes in Indonesia. He holds an MA in economics from Macquarie University and a BA in accounting from Universitas Syiah Kuala.