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| Criterion |  Decision Making Assumption Surfacing |  Architecture Architecture Decision Record |  Decision Making Argument Mapping |  Product Discovery Assumption Mapping |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | Plans often contain assumptions that were never openly stated and remain dangerous precisely because of that. Assumption Surfacing makes these silent premises visible and prioritizes which of them carry the initiative or could sink it. | An ADR permanently records an architecture decision with context, trade-offs, and consequence. It creates continuity for later changes because the decision path stays traceable. | 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 assumptions still sit unordered in the room, it weighs uncertainty against leverage. It makes visible which hypotheses should be checked first. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Low | Medium | Medium |
Timedifferent | 45-90 min | 15-45 min | 1-3 h | 45-60 min |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | 1-3 | 1-8 | 2-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Assumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan | ADR File, Decision Log, Rationale | Argument Map, Evidence Gaps, Decision Rationale | Assumption map, Test backlog, Risk ranking |
Tagsno overlap | AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery | ArchitectureRationaleDocumentationGovernance | SensemakingDecisionRationale | AssumptionsRiskExperimentsValidation |