In this video, I’ll answer the question, what is a Role-Activity Diagram (RAD)? It’s a process mapping tool; so let’s see how it works. RADs are also known as Swimlane Process Diagrams.
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Process Mapping
In an earlier video, I described Robotic Process Automation. It occurred to me when I made that video that charting out how processes work may well come back into fashion.
Back in the late 1990s, every consultancy was looking for ways to streamline processes under initiatives like Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) or Lean.
Role-Activity Diagrams
And one of the tools we used to describe and illustrate those processes was Role-Activity Diagrams, or RADs. They are one way that we can produce a Process Map – a diagram of how a process works.
The Structure of Role-Activity Diagrams
Role-Activity Diagrams are based on three concepts:
- The roles that people, teams, or departments play in the process.
- The activities that players fulfill during the process.
- The interactions between one activity and another.
The RAD below illustrates the process for a Project Manager submitting a Change Request to a Design Authority, on behalf of a stakeholder in the Customer Service Department, after consulting with the IT Department.
Roles in Role-Activity Diagrams
In the diagram, roles are represented by vertical boxes, with the role name at the top. Roles include:
- individuals,
- jobs, positions, or posts,
- teams,
- departments,
- companies in the supply chain
- other organizations like regulators or unions, or
- a class of stakeholders like customers or residents.
Activities in Role-Activity Diagrams
Activities tend to create change, like making, checking, briefing, deciding, or selling.
The interactions between roles are represented by lines. They can be anything that involves two or more roles, such as moving materials or information, allocating or delegating work, authorizing or agreeing to a decision, or reporting status.
To account for all the different types of activities and interactions, we have a range of symbols, like these on the screen. However, I always found it surprising how few symbols we need, to describe any process.
Summing Up Role-Activity Diagrams
I think the days of Project Managers sending out teams to create Role-Activity Diagrams for a huge array of processes (as I did in the 1990s) are likely to be over. But this is a tool that Business Analysts should have up their sleeves. And it is therefore one that we, as Project Managers, ought also to understand.
Swimlane Process Diagrams
Swimlane Process Diagrams are the same as Role Activity Diagrams. However, I recall rarely seeing RADs drawn with the roles shown as horizontal ‘swimlanes’ – they are nearly always shown as vertical ‘stovepipes’. Swimlane Process Diagrams, seem to be shown with the roles as horizontal swimplanes, but that difference is purely cosmetic.
Thank you to community member @sujaym4058 for alerting me to the fact that RADs are also called Swimlane Process Diagrams.
What Kit does a Project Manager Need?
I asked Project Managers in a couple of forums what material things you need to have, to do your job as a Project Manager. They responded magnificently. I compiled their answers into a Kit list. I added my own.
Check out the Kit a Project Manager needs
Note that the links are affiliated.
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