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Accountability the seller cannot blur.
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Building a TSA exit RACI is the work that converts a plan into named accountability. Every exit task needs one owner who is accountable, clear responsibility for who does the work, and explicit lines for who is consulted and informed. Without it, the seller and buyer each assume the other owns the hard tasks. A RACI belongs in the core toolkit of day one readiness.
A project plan lists tasks and dates. It does not say who is accountable when a task slips. A RACI adds that layer. For each task it names who is Responsible for doing the work, who is Accountable for the outcome, who must be Consulted before the work proceeds, and who is Informed once it is done. The accountable role is the one that matters most, because it is the single name that answers for the result.
In a TSA exit the RACI carries extra weight because two organizations share the work. The seller still operates the service, the buyer is building the replacement, and a systems integrator may sit between them. When a migration task fails, the first question is always who owned it. A RACI answers that before the failure, which is the only time the answer is useful.
The discipline that makes a RACI work is the rule of one accountable owner per task. Two accountable owners means none, because each can point at the other. The RACI forces the program to assign a single name to every outcome, and that act of assignment surfaces the tasks nobody wants to own, which are usually the tasks most likely to fail.
The most valuable column in a TSA exit RACI is the one that separates seller responsibility from buyer responsibility. During the TSA the seller operates the service and the buyer consumes it. At exit, responsibility transfers task by task, and the moment of transfer is where work falls through the gap. The RACI names, for every migration task, whether the seller or the buyer is responsible and which side is accountable.
Be explicit about the handover tasks. Data extraction is usually seller responsible, buyer accountable for validation. Knowledge transfer is seller responsible to deliver, buyer accountable to absorb and confirm. Final decommissioning of the seller's environment is seller responsible, buyer accountable to confirm exit criteria were met first. Writing these lines down stops the common dispute where the seller considers a task done and the buyer considers it incomplete.
Where a systems integrator is involved, add them as a distinct party rather than folding them into the buyer. The integrator is often responsible for the build while the buyer remains accountable for the outcome. Blurring the two lets the buyer assume the integrator owns a risk that the contract leaves with the buyer. The RACI keeps that distinction visible.
A RACI is not only about who does the work. The accountable role also carries the decision right for that task within the thresholds set by the steering committee charter. Reading the RACI and the charter together, any person on the program can see who decides a given matter and at what level it escalates. That alignment is what stops decisions either stalling for lack of an owner or being made by someone without the authority.
Keep the consulted role honest. Consulted means the work does not proceed until that party has had input. Overusing it turns every task into a committee and slows the program. Underusing it means decisions are made without the people who hold the relevant risk, such as security or legal, and get reversed later. The RACI should reserve consulted for the parties whose input genuinely changes the outcome.
Informed is the cheapest column and the most neglected. Many exit failures trace back to a party that should have been informed and was not: the customer facing team that did not know a cutover was happening, the finance team that did not know a cost was about to transfer. Populating the informed column deliberately is low effort and prevents the surprises that erode trust between the parties.
The first mistake is too many accountable owners. When a program is anxious about a critical task, the instinct is to make several senior people accountable. The effect is the opposite of control, because shared accountability is no accountability. Force the single owner, even when it is uncomfortable, and give that owner the support of responsible parties rather than co owners.
The second mistake is a RACI that is built once and never updated. Responsibility shifts as the program moves from build to cutover to decommission. A task that is seller responsible during operation becomes buyer responsible after transfer. A RACI frozen at day one misrepresents the program by month three. Review it on the same cadence as the status report and update it when responsibility moves.
The third mistake is treating the RACI as a document for the program office rather than a working tool for the people doing the work. A RACI that lives in a folder and is never referenced does nothing. The version that works is the one pulled up in the workstream meeting when a task is in dispute, used to settle who owns it, and trusted because it was agreed in advance. The escalation playbook depends on this clarity to route issues to the right owner.
Build the RACI at the workstream level, then roll it up. Each functional lead drafts the RACI for their workstream because they know the tasks. The program office checks for the single owner rule, for clean seller and buyer boundaries, and for consistency across workstreams, then assembles the program level view. Bottom up drafting produces a RACI the workstreams believe in, which is the RACI they will actually use.
Tie the RACI to the milestone and status reporting so accountability and progress are read together. When a milestone is at risk, the status report names the milestone and the RACI names the accountable owner. The steering committee then knows both what is slipping and who answers for it, which is the information it needs to act rather than discuss.
Close the program with a RACI that has tracked every transfer of responsibility from seller to buyer. At exit, the RACI should show every task as buyer owned or formally retired, with no task still resting on the seller. That clean state is the evidence that the exit is complete and that no responsibility was left behind with a provider the buyer no longer pays.
Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed. Responsible is who does the work, Accountable is the single owner who answers for the outcome, Consulted are parties whose input is required before proceeding, and Informed are parties told once it is done.
Two accountable owners means neither truly owns the outcome, because each can point to the other when it fails. Forcing a single accountable name surfaces the tasks nobody wants to own, which are usually the ones most at risk.
Treat the seller, the buyer, and any systems integrator as distinct parties. Data extraction is often seller responsible with the buyer accountable for validation, and the integrator may be responsible for the build while the buyer stays accountable for the outcome.
On the same cadence as the status report. Responsibility shifts as the program moves from build to cutover to decommission, so a RACI frozen at day one misrepresents who owns what within a few months.
The membership, decision rights, and cadence that give the buyer control of the exit.
Read the article →How issues move from workstream to committee within defined time limits.
Read the article →The reporting rhythm that pairs progress with named accountability.
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