Utilizing RACI Matrix in Customer Success

Utilizing RACI Matrix in Customer Success 

Which Roles does the Customer Success Team fill? 

Customer Success Managers are typically responsible for a large number of accounts, each with varying levels of complexity, and can struggle when it comes to prioritization, account planning, and delegation. The RACI Matrix is designed to help you organize your team’s work so you can prioritize which tasks should be done first based on their impact on the overall project or account success. It is a tool that CSMs can use to ensure all actions required for a customer’s success are assigned, communicated, and tracked promptly. 

It also allows each team member to know where they stand in relation to their peers, so they aren’t working at cross purposes with someone else’s responsibilities (or worse yet—ignoring them altogether). If there was any confusion about who does what within an organization, this would certainly clear things up! 

RACI stands for the four roles that appear in the matrix: Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed. 

The four roles in the RACI matrix are Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and Informed. The first two roles—Responsible and Accountable—are focused on ensuring you’re doing things right; they involve setting up processes aligned with your organization’s goals and objectives. The Consulted role involves working closely with your clients during implementation or after the project has been launched so they can provide feedback as needed (and make adjustments if necessary). Finally, there’s the Informed role, where each team member receives regular updates about what is happening within their department, so they feel informed about everything going on around them as well as being able to help out where needed without having any information themselves – which makes sense considering these types of projects require lots of collaboration between departments from start to finish! 

For example, if you’re in charge of a customer implementation process, you can use RACI to map out your customer’s internal teams and the different methods involved. 

A classic project/task management tool, the RACI Matrix is a great way to map out your customer’s internal teams and the different processes involved in their journey. For example, if you’re in charge of a customer implementation process and want to know who should be responsible for each task associated with that process (i.e., what role or person within their company needs to sign off on each step), look at the RACI matrix! 

The four roles are: Responsible – those who have authority over an area; Accountable – those who have responsibility for completing tasks; Consulted – those who provide information about whether something can be done today; Informed – those whose expertise helps make decisions about the next steps. 

You have a box at every task and team member’s intersection. Each box represents a task, which is assigned to a team member. The team member is responsible for completing the job and should be consulted before it’s finished. If they don’t complete it in time, they’re accountable for why their work didn’t meet expectations or deadlines (and could face disciplinary action). 

Responsible: Who performs the action?  

Who manages and executes task completion? This is where things get messy because it’s not always clear who should take care of what when working with customers or partners. You might have an intern or junior team member take care of some things while senior members of your company manage others (e.g., marketing). 

The “R” role is the person with the ultimate responsibility for creating the deliverable. There should only be one person in this role. In most cases, this will be the CSM responsible for the customer. This person should have a defined goal, task, and deliverable that are measurable by an agreed-upon date. The R’s only other responsibilities are communicating with others on their team, so they can work together to achieve their overall success goal in Customer Success. 

Accountable: Who is accountable?  

The “A” stands for Accountable. This person gives final approval before a task can be marked as done. That person might not be doing any of the work themselves, but they are ultimately responsible for completing it on time and within budget. This is usually a manager or someone above the performer in the chain of command. If something goes wrong, they take responsibility for it. There should only be one accountable person. 

The accountable person is also responsible for ensuring others don’t mess up or take shortcuts when they should be working hard on their projects. If you’re new to customer success workflows, it can be easy to get overwhelmed by how many people are involved in any project! 

Consulted: Who needs to be consulted before making decisions?  

“C” means Consulted. These individuals need to be asked for input and have an opportunity to give feedback before anything gets approved. You can also use the matrix to see who else needs to be consulted and what roles they play in your organization or project. In addition, you must identify all of these people upfront. Hence, there are no surprises later in the process when it comes time for approval decisions or implementation of new processes/procedures related to this project or initiative. 

Informed: Who needs to know about project status updates?  

These people don’t need to participate in decision-making actively but must stay informed about status updates as you go along. If you have more than one person in this role, ensure you’re communicating consistently with everyone equally, so no information gets lost along the way. 

In short, 

The RACI matrix is a classic project/task management tool that helps you assign and track responsibilities and break down complex workflows. It’s one of the most popular tools in the customer success world, but it cannot be easy to implement due to its complexity. It provides a framework for how different people should interact and work together on a project. It helps communicate expectations across the team and show what’s expected from each person contributing to your product or service. 

Learn more about the RACI Matrix here: https://academy.practicalcsm.com/using-the-raci-matrix/ 

Now that you know the model’s basics and understand its meaning, why not try applying it to your process?