---
name: responsibility-assignment-matrix
description: Use when asked to build a Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM) — a grid mapping team members to tasks with a responsibility level in each cell — as the general umbrella concept behind named variants like raci-matrix, RACIO, and PARIS.
---

# Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM)

A Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM) is a grid or table mapping team
members or roles against tasks or deliverables, with each cell showing
the level of responsibility that person or role holds for that item —
used to clarify who does what on a project and to prevent gaps or
overlaps in accountability.

## Structure

Rows (or columns) list team members or roles; the other axis lists tasks
or deliverables; each intersecting cell records a responsibility level
using one of several coding schemes.

## Named variants

- **RACI** (Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed) — the most
  widely used variant; see [[raci-matrix]] for the detailed
  definition of each level.
- **RACIO** — RACI plus **Omitted**, explicitly marking that a role has
  no involvement in a given task, rather than leaving the cell blank
  with ambiguous meaning.
- **PARIS** (Participate, Approve, Responsible, Input, Sign-off) — a
  further variant with a different set of responsibility levels, better
  suited to some organizations' approval-heavy workflows.

Different teams and organizations favor different variants; the
underlying purpose — an explicit, shared record of who does what — is
the same across all of them.

## Building and maintaining one

- Identify all tasks or deliverables and all team members or roles.
- Assign a responsibility level to each cell using the team's chosen
  coding scheme.
- **Communicate it to all stakeholders** — a RAM that only the person who
  built it has seen doesn't achieve its purpose.
- **Review and update it regularly** as the project or team evolves —
  see [[statement-of-work]], which itself references a RACIO
  matrix in its own Responsibilities section, and
  [[risks-actions-issues-decisions]] for the kind of living
  project artifact a RAM should be tracked alongside.

## Common pitfalls

- **Leaving cells blank instead of using an explicit "none" marker** —
  ambiguous about whether the gap is deliberate or an oversight; RACIO's
  explicit "Omitted" exists specifically to solve this.
- **Too many people marked Accountable (or its equivalent) for one task**
  — diffuses accountability exactly where the matrix is meant to make it
  clear; most variants work best with exactly one accountable party per
  item.
- **Building it once and never revisiting it** — a RAM that doesn't
  track role changes, scope changes, or new tasks becomes actively
  misleading rather than just outdated.
- **Choosing a variant without checking what the team already uses** —
  introducing RACI to a team already fluent in PARIS (or vice versa)
  adds translation overhead for no real benefit; ask before assuming.

## Learn more

- [[raci-matrix]] for the most common named variant, in detail.
- [[statement-of-work]] for a document that commonly includes a RACIO matrix as part of defining responsibilities.
- [[risks-actions-issues-decisions]] for another living project-tracking artifact commonly maintained alongside a RAM.