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| Criterion |  Operations 5 Whys |  Agile Mad Sad Glad |  Agile Sailboat Retrospective |  Agile Starfish Retrospective |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | For a single, hard-to-explain deviation, the method exposes the causal chain behind the visible symptom. It keeps the cause open until a controllable condition emerges instead of a mere description. | When a team's or workshop's mood needs to become readable, it structures emotional signals with little setup. It makes strain, relief, and sources of energy tangible. | When a team wants to read momentum, brakes, and risks together, it offers an easily understandable picture of the situation. It makes drive, obstacles, and headwind visible in the same picture. | When improvement options need to be sorted more finely than just start and stop, it brings observations into clear kinds of action. This makes visible what should be done more, less, newly, or continued. |
Complexitysame | Low | Low | Low | Low |
Timedifferent | 15-30 min | 30-60 min | 45-90 min | 45-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 2-6 | 3-10 | 4-12 | 4-12 |
Formatsame | Workshop | Workshop | Workshop | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Root cause notes, Countermeasures | Emotion Board, Themes, Action Items | Sailboat Board, Risks, Improvement Actions | Starfish Board, Practice Changes, Experiments |
Tagsno overlap | Root causeIncidentLeanProblem solving | RetrospectiveTeamReflection | RetrospectiveTeamImprovement | RetrospectiveImprovementExperimentsTeam |