What is RACI Matrix? PMP Exam Tip

Hello and welcome everybody. In today's video, I am going to share a PMP exam tip with you. Today's video, we are going to cover what is a RACI chart. A RACI chart is a type of responsibility assignment matrix, otherwise known as RAM, that shows the roles and tasks assigned to each team member visually. Here is an example of a RACI matrix. What you can see here is that all of the activities are listed in the rows and then the different tasks, different functions within the project are listed in the columns. In the intersection, you have the acronym RACI. So you probably are wondering now, what does RACI stand for? Well, RACI stands for Responsible, Accountable, Consult, and Inform. And the intersection of the row of the project versus the activity task will show you what that person is responsible for within that project. In other words, it identifies the roles and responsibilities of the individual in that task or project. So just by glancing at this chart, you can figure out who Who is doing what on the project. Now let's dive deeper into what RACI means. First up is the R, which stands for responsible. So this team member is responsible for carrying out the activities required to complete the task. So each activity has to have at least one team member who's responsible for completing it. You can have more than one team member responsible for completing the task. So this person is the person who's in charge of completing the task. Next up is the A, which stands for accountable. This team member is accountable for the job. In smaller projects, the team member can be responsible and accountable for the same task, but it's a good idea to separate these roles for larger projects. This team member will be answerable to the project manager about the progress and review the task to ensure that it's being completed properly. Please keep in mind that all tasks must have a responsible and an accountable team member. Though the task can have multiple responsible parties, it is best to have only one person who's accountable for that individual task in order to avoid confusion and allow faster decision-making. There can be more accountable team members for a task that is bigger and more complex. Next up, we have the C in the RACI chart, which stands for consult. So consulting team members give their input and help define each task. These team members need to be contacted if any technical clarifications are needed or if the deliverable has to be changed or reviewed. Responsible and consulting team members must have 2-way communication. Lastly, we have inform. These team members have no direct involvement in the particular task but are kept informed about the progress of the task in question. They have the potential to be a replacement if other team members leave the project or is assigned elsewhere. There is a one-way communication with this group of team members. Now let's talk about some of the benefits and drawbacks of the RACI chart. Let's start off with the benefits. So a huge benefit of using the RACI diagram is that it shows you visually what all of the team members' roles and responsibilities are, and this helps you eliminate the confusion and eliminate unnecessary tasks. It helps you see who is responsible and what— who is doing what, so this will avoid potential conflicts. It also ensures smoother handoff once the project is over. Also, it helps you with resource allocation and enables faster decision-making because everyone knows who is accountable, who is responsible, and who is supposed to do what. Now let's talk about some of the drawbacks of using RACI. So in complex projects, there often is too many items on the RACI chart, which makes it really hard to read and understand. And once you start having a lot of different stakeholders in a lot of different roles and responsibilities, for example, like 3 different people responsible for a task and 2 people that's accountable. It just gets really messy as to who actually has the decision-making power and who gets to do what. Also, in complex projects, the team members don't necessarily fit nicely into the 4 RACI categories because the project is more complex, which makes it much harder to create this chart. Also, the RACI matrix lacks a flexibility to change roles and responsibilities once they have been assigned. Okay, now that we understand the benefits and drawbacks, you're probably wondering, well, on my PMP exam, I might be asked to create one of these matrixes, so how do I do that? So you will create it by following these 3 steps. First, you will list all of the roles on your projects, such as project manager, planning engineer, construction engineer, etc., etc. So you'll list all of the roles in your project And then you can put the team member's name next to it if you choose to. Next, you will list all of the tasks. Now review the project work, break it down into tasks, and list all of them. For example, developing the project plan, identifying risk, testing deliverables, maintaining records, or what have you. Once this is done, you can enter the information in the first vertical column, and we will show an example of that just coming up. So let's Step number 3 is to assign the value. So for the team member who is responsible, you'll put an R, accountable, you put an A, consult, you put a C, and inform, you put an I. So here's the example that we saw at the beginning. So you have all the project rows listed in the columns, you have all of the tasks here listed in the rows, and in the intersection, you would put either R, A, C, or I representing what that specific individual is doing for that specific task. Task. Now, just before we wrap up this video, let's just talk about some other considerations. If there are roles, make sure you update them in the RACI chart. If any— if your project changes, if people leave the project, if people change tasks, make sure your RACI chart is updated. You have to ensure that every single task has at least one person who's responsible and one person who's accountable as well. Avoid having too many tasks. If you do, maybe you want to create the RACI chart for the work package level and not for the task level, because if you have too many tasks, the chart would just be too messy to read. And avoid sharing accountability for a single task as well. It's good to just have one person who's accountable for each task. Lastly, there are some alternatives to RACI as well. It's not the only type of chart that shows the roles and responsibilities on a project. Here are some alternatives that I've listed. Some include the RATSI, which stands for Authority, Responsible, Task, Support, and Informed, or CARS, which stands for Communicate, Approve, Responsible, Support, or DACI, which stands for Drivers, Approvers, Consult, and Informed. So you will find many types of responsibility assignment matrix in project management. However, the pin box and what you need to know for the PMP exam is just the RACI chart. I hope you found this video helpful. Please like and subscribe to our channel, and if you want a free one and a half hour training on how you can pass your PMP certification in the next six weeks, please be sure to check out our free class, and you can sign up at www.examspm.com/free. I'll also include a link in the comment section below. Thank you so much for joining us today, and I can't wait to see you again.