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| Criterion | ![]() Decision Making Argument Mapping | ![]() Innovation Brainstorming | ![]() Architecture Request for Comments | ![]() Innovation Lotus Blossom |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | When statements, evidence, and counterarguments get mixed up, a debate quickly loses its structure. Argument Mapping breaks a thesis down into its reasoning and makes visible what it really rests on. | When a team faces an open question with many obvious directions, the method first creates breadth instead of premature commitment. It separates idea flow from evaluation and makes lines of thought visible, creating a pool for selection and further development. | An RFC clarifies architecture context, options, and consequences. It structures technical context, alternatives, tradeoffs, open questions, and review feedback, and captures the result as an RFC document, reviewer comments, and a decision rationale. | When a central question feels too large, the method breaks it into neighboring topic fields with their own depth of ideation. It holds structure and openness at the same time, so adjacent perspectives don't get lost. This grows an idea space out of a core problem. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Low | Medium | Low |
Timedifferent | 1-3 h | 30-60 min | 1-3 Wochen vom Draft bis zur Entscheidung | 45-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 1-8 | 4-12 | 3-20 Reviewer | 3-10 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop | Async | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Argument Map, Evidence Gaps, Decision Rationale | Idea pool, Theme clusters, Shortlist | RFC document, Reviewer comments, Decision rationale, Follow-up ADR or tickets | Lotus Diagram, Idea Themes, Shortlist |
Tagsno overlap | SensemakingDecisionRationale | BrainstormingIdeationCreativityWorkshopDivergence | ArchitectureDecisionAsyncGovernance | BrainstormingIdeationCreativityDivergenceWorkshop |



