Responsibility mapping
Map supplied work and decisions into an evidence-bounded responsibility and decision-rights view. Use only information supplied in the conversation and this skill text. Do not browse, call tools, inspect files, execute code, create artifacts, or take external actions. Return the mapping directly in chat.
Scope and inputs
Use supplied work items, decisions, people or roles, assignments, authority statements, dependencies, dates, consequences, and escalation directions. Attribute material claims to their supplied speaker or source. Distinguish facts, proposals, interpretations, and unknowns. A role, work-item, or outcome label is not evidence of completion, authority, priority, risk, approval, or impact.
If a decision-changing assignment or authority fact is absent, ask the smallest useful question while producing the supported portions. Do not manufacture an owner, reporting line, approval right, status, deadline, or escalation path.
Definitions
- Accountable: the one person or role answerable for a work item or decision; this is an assigned or proposed designation, not necessarily the person doing the work.
- Responsible: people or roles assigned to perform, coordinate, or contribute work.
- Consulted: people or roles whose input is required or explicitly requested before a stated decision or action.
- Informed: people or roles explicitly named to receive information after a stated point.
- Decision right: an explicitly supplied authority to decide, approve, recommend, veto, or escalate a defined matter.
- Escalation boundary: a supplied condition that directs an unresolved, blocked, or out-of-scope matter to a named role or forum.
Method
- Extract each distinct work item and decision. Preserve supplied wording where useful, but give every row a neutral activity label or future-state label unless completion is explicitly supplied. For example, use "Prepare quarterly forecast" or "Quarterly forecast submission status unknown," not "Submitted quarterly forecast," when no submission evidence is supplied.
- Record supplied status separately from the label. Use only an explicit supplied status; otherwise write "status unknown." Do not convert a plan, assignment, due date, past-tense wording, or desired outcome into evidence that work was completed.
- For each row, record one accountable owner only when supplied. If more than one accountable owner is supplied, preserve the conflict and mark the row "accountability unresolved" rather than choosing one. If no accountable owner is supplied, leave it unassigned and state the ownership gap.
- Add responsible, consulted, and informed participants only where their roles are supplied or directly supported. Keep proposed assignments visibly proposed. Separate action responsibility from decision authority.
- Capture decision rights and escalation boundaries exactly as supplied. When a decision is blocked by missing authority, competing owners, or an absent escalation route, state that gap; do not infer a manager, governance body, or escalation deadline.
- List supplied consequences or priorities alongside their source. Do not infer, classify, rank, or elevate compliance, legal, customer, financial, reputational, operational, or any other risk solely from a work-item label, adjective, category, or phrase such as "legal-sensitive." Prioritize only consequences, obligations, urgency, or dependencies actually supplied; otherwise record priority as unknown.
- Produce a concise mapping table and a separate unresolved-gaps list. Treat the map as an analysis of supplied material, not an authorization, workflow update, or completed assignment.
Output
Return: scope and source notes; a table with work item or decision, explicit status, accountable owner, responsible participants, consulted participants, informed participants, decision right, escalation boundary, supplied consequences or priority basis, and unresolved gaps; then a short list of questions needed to resolve material gaps.
Quality checks
- Each work or decision row has at most one accountable owner; competing claims remain visible.
- Every completion statement, date, approval, authority, and consequence is traceable to supplied information.
- Neutral or future-state labels are used unless completion is explicitly supplied; absent status is shown as unknown.
- No risk or priority is inferred from labels alone.
- Proposed roles, unknowns, and escalation gaps are not presented as settled facts.
Examples
If notes say "Mina will prepare the quarterly forecast; Diego approves the forecast; counsel must be consulted before a tax treatment decision," map preparation as assigned to Mina, approval as Diego's supplied decision right, and counsel as consulted for that decision. If the notes do not say the forecast was submitted, use a neutral label and status unknown.
If a work list calls an item "legal-sensitive" but supplies no consequence, obligation, or priority, record that descriptor as a label or source wording only; do not call it a compliance or legal risk or rank it above other work.
If notes name both the sales lead and operations lead as accountable for renewal approval, mark accountability unresolved and ask who holds the final decision right. Do not select an owner based on title.
If an agreement says product design escalates a blocked launch decision to the steering committee, record that boundary. If no time limit or authority after escalation is supplied, leave both unknown.