Frequently Asked Questions About MOCHA

Published: October 27, 2021
Estimated reading time: 10 min

Here are some of the most common questions we hear about MOCHA. Before you dive in, learn more aboutClarifying Responsibilities with MOCHA.

FAQs About MOCHA Roles

What is the relationship between manager and owner?

Project owners thrive and grow when they have real responsibility for project success—and it’s the manager’s role to support them. This means trusting owners to fully own the work and setting them up for success.

Typically, the manager and owner of a project should be different people since the manager’s role is to serve as a coach. In most other cases:

• The owner coordinates the people and logistics to move a project forward. They may not make all the decisions, but they will spot decision points that emerge and involve others appropriately. They have overall responsibility for success and make sure each person knows what’s expected and how to engage (whether they are an M, H, C, or A). They manage up and sideways in the process.
• 经理的工作是有意地将责任的重量转移给老板，并帮助他取得成功。这意味着提供支持和资源，询问试探性的问题，给予反馈，并且只有在项目偏离轨道的真正风险出现时才进行干预。根据项目的不同，他们可能是也可能不是业主的监理人。经理还帮助所有者了解使每个助手、顾问或审批者很好地适合其项目角色的比较优势。

Use ourDelegation WorksheetandGetting Alignedto figure out what information and resources you need to share. See also,Deciding What to Delegate with Comparative Advantage.

What’s the difference between helper and consulted?

Helpers do concrete pieces of work. They are mini-owners on their piece of a project. Consulteds offer opinions and advice at critical moments in the project or need to be kept in the loop. It’s often helpful to use parentheses after names to clarify the type of help or input the person will be asked for. For example: You might clarify Helper: Jamie (outreach) and Consulted: J’Nae (event venues). Then follow up with your team to say, “I (the owner) will finalize details after J’Nae has a chance to weigh in on the pros and cons of possible event venues. From there, Jamie will be leading outreach including X, Y, and Z.”

How many consulteds is too many?

Often a well-intentioned desire to make everyone feel included leads to too many people being looped into a project. Think about emails you’ve received with 20 other people cc’d! This can drain time and resources. Start by asking: who is best positioned to help us get the results we want? Who is most impacted and therefore needs to be consulted or informed? Be strategic and precise about who you’re consulting and what level of input you’re asking for. From there, consider other ways to keep the broader group of people informed, inspired, and excited about a project. For more, see“What about people I just need to inform without consulting?”

Can I assign more than one owner?

Resist the urge to put more than one owner on a project at the same time. You might think that doubling or tripling the number of people looking out for the overall success of a project would increase its chances of success but—more often than not—the overall responsibility gets diffused unless there’s clear role delineation and one clear owner. Instead:

• 决定哪一个人最适合拥有这项工作(计划，协调其他人，保持球的运动，等等)，并阐明其他人将如何在项目的具体部分上作为顾问、助手或批准者做出贡献。
• 使用层叠MOCHA来感谢那些“拥有”大量工作流的助手。将你的项目职责细分为子类别。指定一个人来领导整个项目，然后确定哪些助手拥有一个重要的或独立的工作，以保证其自己的MOCHA。(SeeClarifying Responsibilities with MOCHAfor a sample).
• 对于较大的项目，或者当从一个阶段到下一个阶段的所有权有明确的中继时，为每个阶段创建一个MOCHA。明确项目第1阶段的所有者和第2阶段的不同所有者。根据项目的不同，阶段1的所有者可能会作为经理、顾问或阶段2的审批人留在团队中，或者他们可能会完全移交指挥棒。如果有一个明确的继电器，考虑在组合中至少有一个一致的经理或批准人来保持跨阶段的更大的图景。

Should I use MOCHA if it’s just me and my manager?

MOCHA是一个在3人或3人以上的项目中明确角色的工具。对任何项目来说，清楚所有者和管理者的角色都是很重要的，但你不需要为此绘制一个MOCHA图表。说说看。

As a manager, I plan to weigh in and help out. Should I be on the MOCHA as consulted, helper,andmanager?

If you’re managing well, you shouldn’t need to be listed as a consulted. Part of delegating is making sure you share any background context, opinions, and resources you have with the owner as part of setting them up for success. As the manager, you’ll consult, spot, give feedback, and ask questions throughout the project. When it comes to helping, it will depend on the project. You might be assigned a helper role when the task is concrete and outside the scope of the manager role (for example, confirming a speaker for an event or being assigned to book the caterer).

Managers shouldbe careful not to jump in and take over当项目进行得不顺利时(除非这是一个高风险的情况，在这种情况下，经理必须介入，事后应该促使反思为什么这是必要的)。例如，如果一位经理看到一封筹款信效果不佳，他们就不应该重写它来接管所有权。相反，他们应该与所有者讨论需要更改的元素，所有者应该重写。

Can there be multiple approvers?

Yes. When possible, be clear about what each approver is approving. One person might be approving the budget while another approves programming.

If you find yourself with a long list of approvers, ask yourself who really needs to be on that list. Often you’ll realize that some of those people should be consulted, but don’t need to be approvers. If your organization is structured in such a way that multiple approvers are unavoidable, acknowledge that and plan around it. Figure out a plan for how they will get aligned and resolve differences of opinion, so the owner doesn’t have to shuttle back and forth resolving differences. Clarify your team’s decision-making process, which is separate from your MOCHA.

我听你说过层叠摩卡。你能举个例子吗?

层叠摩卡就像一个迷你摩卡。当一个帮手需要其他人来完成一项工作时，他就成为了这第二层的主人。下面是一个典型的摩卡图表，括号中明确了每个人的贡献。在级联MOCHA中，来自第1层的助手(在本例中是Alex)成为第二个工作流的所有者。他们拥有一切与音乐有关的活动，他们自己的组的人咨询和帮助。在这种情况下，整个活动的所有者(Jayden)成为支持Alex的经理和批准人。根据需要，您可以根据自己的上下文对其进行调整。

Tier 1: MOCHA for Back to School Night

Tier 2: Back to School Night—Musical Performance

FAQs About MOCHA Implementation

How is MOCHA different from role expectations or job responsibilities?

MOCHA is not a job description or adivision of labor for your team, which typically outlines more static job roles among a group of people. If you are using MOCHA regularly for your projects, MOCHA language can certainly be a component of your team’s division of labor—and your check-ins (“Hey, would you mind owning that? I’ll help with X and Y.”). The tools complement each other, but we don’t recommend introducing MOCHA at the team level until you’ve tried it on projects. With MOCHA, roles could shift during the course of a project or someone could be owning a project that falls outside their normal job description.

If you notice someone popping up on multiple MOCHAs to help with something outside their job role, it might be an area of work you want to recognize by adding it to theirrole expectations, so their labor can be recognized.

我们有摩卡。现在，我们如何做决定?

您的组织决策过程将告知如何做出项目决策。Your MOCHA will help you clarifywho涉及哪些领域，但它不会创建一个决策过程。这是因为MOCHA并不是一个决策工具;它是一个项目规划工具。

MOCHA works best when everyone is empowered to make decisions about their area of work. The owner ensures everyone knows what they are being asked to do, consult on, or decide—and then makes some or all decisions, either individually or in coordination with their manager/approver. Where your decision-making norms call for consensus, you might name the working group or leadership table as your approver so long as you have a clear process for resolving disagreements so the work doesn’t bottleneck. Where you have a hierarchical decision structure, you might consider which projects could be owned and approved by a more distributed team of staff leaders closest to the work.

Whatever your organizational decision process, we recommend owners clarifymodes of decision-makingto get everyone on the same page at key points during the project. You can also pair MOCHA withFair Process当你考虑谁扮演哪个角色时。

How can we use MOCHA in a highly collaborative or consensus-based setting?

我们发现，MOCHA在高度协作的环境中尤其有用，在这种环境中，团队通过讨论和共识做出决定。在这种情况下，你可以MOCHA不需要完全团队一致同意的特定工作片段，或者MOCHA在项目需要在整个团队之前完成的第一步。例如，一个全州范围的联盟可以决定谁拥有一个政策论坛的外联和沟通(新闻发布、媒体名单、在线注册、社交媒体计划)，谁应该是一个助手或咨询。那么，联盟(或联盟的一个子集)可能是总体的审批者。MOCHA团队作为一个工作小组推动沟通工作，这样全州范围内的联盟可以把会议时间集中在其他工作上(例如，关于战略的决定，政策建议，或目标设定)。

MOCHA seems hierarchical. Do senior leaders always need to be approvers or managers?

Your MOCHA doesn’t have to reflect the way power is already organized within your organization. For example, on an upcoming fundraiser, your ED might be a helper making confirmation calls to major donors, your most junior staff person can be the event coordinator (owner), and a middle manager who’s hosted several successful fundraising galas could be the best manager and approver for this project.

如果你的所有项目似乎都因为一个审批人而陷入瓶颈，或者在帮助或咨询的人之间存在差异，而没有机会获得更大的自主权，停下来反思一下。寻找一个可以通过添加不同的批准人来中断模式的项目，并以让更多的人参与并在组织中更公平地分配所有权的方式来分解项目。

那我不用咨询就能通知的人呢?

我们经常被问到MOCHA的C和darci的I之间的区别，确实有区别。当你摩卡时，你可能会发现有一些人你需要通知(在项目之前、期间或之后)，但不完全咨询。Here are two options for keeping folks in the loop:

1. 双C !在C栏中，区分你将咨询谁和你将与谁交流。
2. Add an “I” to make a MOCHAI. This makes it clear that a co-director, partner, or other stakeholder will be kept in the loop.

In either option, use the parenthesis to get explicit about what information just needs to be shared and when you’ll share it.

Find additional resources on MOCHA:

• Clarifying Responsibilities with MOCHA
• Making MOCHA Work For You (Videos!)
• Sample Email to Introduce the MOCHA Model

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