Genevieve Taylor’s Blog

How did I miss this?

I was reading an article by Larry Kirchenbauer, a local leadership consultant, and he talked about helping a client become more able to set expectations, keep her team accountable, and achieve their goals.  The responsibility matrix was one of the tools that helped them clarify roles.  I have seen versions of it before, but not “the original.”

The idea is that there are various roles in a project, and each of these roles participates in a different way.  Depending on the task, these roles need to be identified as:

• Responsible: responsible for implementation.
• Accountable: the ONE person who takes ultimate responsibility for the entire project.
• Consulted: internal expertise that is accessed to incorporate ideas and different perspectives into the project or task.
• Informed: those people who need to be informed of progress or results, as they will be impacted or will use the end result in some way.

I could see this tool as being particularly useful for ongoing processes or long-term, complex projects.  I will certainly use it in the future!

Here is an article in wikipedia that has a nice overview, plus it reviews several other models (including support, verification, signatories, etc.)

Responsibility assignment matrix – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.