Roles and Responsibilities Guide

A roles and responsibilities guide provides clear communication around who does what on your team. It lists the most common tasks undertaken by your team and explicitly states who is responsible, who supports, and who provides advice and reviews the work.

See example file here.

Benefits

• Better staffing plans. Knowing who does what allows you to make informed estimates of the work per role for a certain customer or group of customers.
• Prevents duplicate or forgotten work by streamlining communication around roles and responsibilities.

Creation

Gather some inputs

All of the following resources can help you build your roles and responsibilities document:

• Your calendar
• Your project management software
• Your company’s goals
• Your team’s goals
• Your goals
• Career ladder
• Staffing plan
• Job postings

List out all roles that exist on your team

Build a list of all tasks your team undertakes throughout the year

Don’t worry about any of the following during this process:

• Formatting
• Grouping
• Close duplicates

Group tasks together and create headings

Assign one of the following to each task:

Responsible: The individual ultimately responsible for accomplishing the task on time and within budget.

Support: The individual who supports the accomplishment of a task

Advise/Review: The individual who advises and reviews a task.

Review with your team

I recommend reviewing individually with those in each role and then reviewing it together as a team.

When to reference

• Team structure changes.
• One-on-one meetings with your direct manager or direct reports.
• When setting personal goals. Individuals in each role should have personal goals that provide them the opportunity to grow by accomplishing tasks in the role above them.

When to deviate from the guide

You will inevitably deviate from this guide based on resources, emergency situations, etc. However, if these deviations become routine, it is time to update the guide.