RACI Chart
A role-assignment matrix that clarifies who does what for every significant task, deliverable, or decision in a project.
Explanation
RACI is an acronym for four types of participation:
- R — Responsible. Those doing the work to complete the task.
- A — Accountable. Those making sure the work gets done. Exactly one person per row — accountability must not be split.
- C — Consulted. Those giving feedback — subject matter experts, decision makers.
- I — Informed. Those who just need to know the final decision or that a task is complete.
The matrix is built with tasks as rows and people (or roles) as columns. Each cell contains R, A, C, I, or is blank.
Application
Use a RACI chart:
- At the end of initiation to ratify role clarity before kicking off planning
- Whenever you add new workstreams or shuffle team composition
- As the reference during change-management — change requests get routed through the A for each affected area
Guardrails:
- Every row should have exactly one A (accountable).
- Rows with no R indicate nobody’s doing the work.
- People with lots of As are bottlenecks.
- People with only Is may not need to be in project meetings.
Connections
- stakeholder-analysis — feeds the column list
- project-charter — charter references the RACI
- course-2-project-initiation course-4-project-execution
Open Questions
- The source’s RACI matrix is referenced as an image but not included textually. The prose definition above is complete.