[Build] RACI (responsible, accountable, consulted, informed)

[Shannon Lee]

The person doing a task always ends up, to one extent or another, deferring
to the Cost of the task: the cost in time, the cost in effort, the cost in
money and social capital. In order to prevent the Costs from becoming the
ultimate arbiter of what gets done, someone else should be responsible for
looking out for the Value of the project: making sure that what's being
done is done completely and as it needs to be in the end.

I think that the Responsible party (in RACI) should have the authority they
need to get tasks done; the Accountable party should have the authority to
tell the Responsible party whether they're done or not. Some of you will
recognize this as a Product Owner / Dev Lead split.

--S


On Wed, Jun 25, 2014 at 10:11 AM, Michael Schaffer <mwschaffer at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Thank you David for that clarification.
>
> In my experience, the one "rule" is that Responsibility and Authority
> should be closely bound.  If you carry the responsibility (for getting
> something done), you need the Authority to make decisions (for example, to
> spend money).  The "responsible" party is the one that sets the direction
> ... the "what", in terms of "what are we doing?", and perhaps "why?"
>
> David's renaming of "Accountable" to "Assists" is helpful, in that it
> clarifies that those people are supporting the decisions and direction of
> the Responsible party.
>
> That said, a good "Responsible" party should use his/her team (of all the
> other roles) to build consensus and seek expertise wherever it resides.
>  The "Assisters" (the "doers") need enough authority to execute the plan
> (they are responsible for the "how", as "How are we going to do this task?")
>
> ---
>
> I hope that bit of Management 101 is useful.
>
> Michael
>
>
>
>
> -------------------------
> Michael Schaffer
> mwschaffer at gmail.com
> ---
>
>
> On Wed, Jun 25, 2014 at 9:43 AM, davidfine <d at vidfine.com> wrote:
>
>>  Wish I could have been there to clarify how the RACI model was used at
>> my nonprofit. (We used the version called DARCI because it was less of a
>> flat hierarchy).
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Responsibility_assignment_matrix#RACI_.28alternative_scheme.29
>>
>>   *Responsible* There should be exactly one person with this assignment
>> for each task.  They delegate and work and make sure their team has
>> everything they need to get it done to spec. They make adjustments to the
>> plan as needed. They are the point of contact, and the one that reports
>> back about progress. They are the one person whose neck is on the line.
>>
>> *Assists aka Accountable * Those who assist completion of the task. The
>> worker bees. Most tasks will have many, all coordinated by the
>> 'Responsible'. They often have more expertise in their work than the 'R'
>> does, so they get to choose what tools to use and other specifics that
>> weren't covered by the spec. For small tasks the 'R' and 'A' may be the
>> same person.
>>     *Consulted* Those whose opinions are sought; and with whom there is
>> two-way communication. Outside experts. Other teams who will be impacted by
>> your work.
>>     *Informed* Those who are kept up-to-date on progress; and with whom
>> there is one-way communication. The mailing list.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 6/25/14, 7:25 AM, Naomi Most wrote:
>>
>> Greetings Rebooters,
>>
>> TL;DR -- if your name was on the board yesterday, please start a
>> thread right now on the Build list to describe your area(s) of
>> Accountability and recruit help.
>>
>> We talked last night about using the "Responsibility Assignment
>> Matrix" to manage our projects.
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Responsibility_assignment_matrix
>>
>> Click on that link to the expanded definitions.
>>
>> Last night we attempted to assign an "accountable" role to each
>> project and collect any interested "consulting" or "responsible"
>> roles.
>>
>> The "informed" role goes to the Build mailing list.  I'll read it
>> obsessively and occasionally pry for more information when I think
>> someone's missed some information that another project needs.
>>
>> CONCERNS about this system:
>>
>> There was a lot of mixup between "accountable" and "responsible" in
>> our discussion last night.  I was a little sleep-deprived and couldn't
>> keep them straight myself.
>>
>> We may want to make the world easier *and* more fun for ourselves by
>> making up our own parallel system.  For example:
>>
>> Accountable = BOFH
>> Responsible = Developer
>> Consulted = Bikeshedder
>> Informed = Mailing List
>>
>> (We can do better than that, of course.)
>>
>> Or we can just all agree to get really good at knowing the difference
>> between "responsible" and "accountable", but as a user interface, I
>> wouldn't call this nomenclature intuitive.
>>
>> DISCUSS!  :)
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Naomi
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Build mailing list
>> Build at lists.noisebridge.net
>> https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/build
>>
>>
>
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>


-- 
Shannon Lee
(503) 539-3700

"Any sufficiently slow descent into barbarism is indistinguishable from
normalcy."

                -- @mediapathic
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