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| Criterion |  Decision Making Assumption Surfacing |  Architecture Request for Comments |  Decision Making Trade-off Analysis |  Decision Making Decision Matrix |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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 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. | With limited resources, quality, speed, cost, and risk almost always compete with each other. Trade-off Analysis makes these tensions explicit and prevents decisions from producing hidden side effects. | When several options collide with several criteria, comparison quickly becomes subjective. A Decision Matrix makes the trade-off visible and brings weighting, criteria, and options into a shared logic. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Medium | Medium | Medium |
Timedifferent | 45-90 min | 1-3 Wochen vom Draft bis zur Entscheidung | 45-120 min | 45-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | 3-20 Reviewer | 2-8 | 2-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Assumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan | RFC document, Reviewer comments, Decision rationale, Follow-up ADR or tickets | Trade-off Matrix, Criteria List, Decision Rationale, Accepted Downsides | Decision Matrix, Scoring Rationale, Selected Option |
Tags1 shared | AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery | ArchitectureDecisionAsyncGovernance | TradeoffsDecisionCriteriaOptions | DecisionCriteriaScoringTradeoffs |