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| Criterion |  Product Discovery Context Canvas |  Operations Root Cause Analysis |  Operations Causal Factor Analysis |  Operations Barrier Analysis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | When an environment of users, systems, and constraints is hard to grasp, it puts the context compactly on the table. It creates a clear reading of influence, boundary, and dependency. | When a problem keeps recurring and the cause stays unclear, the method exposes the underlying mechanism. It separates symptom, guess, and robust explanation from one another. | For an event with a complicated course, the method breaks down the contributing factors along the timeline. It shows how conditions, decisions, and reactions together produce a course of events. | For a risk that can only be managed through multiple layers of protection, the method examines the effectiveness of each barrier. It shows where safeguards are missing, too weak, or fail under real conditions. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Medium | High | Medium |
Timedifferent | 45-90 min | 1-4 h | 2-6 h | 2-4 h |
Participantsdifferent | 3-10 | 3-8 | 3-10 | 2-6 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Context canvas, Open questions, Shared context notes | Problem Statement, Cause Hypotheses, Confirmed Causes, Action Plan | Event Timeline, Causal Factor Chart, Cause List, Corrective Actions | Barrier Inventory, Failure Analysis per Barrier, Action Backlog |
Tagsno overlap | ContextFramingRequirementsCanvas | Root causeProblem solvingQualityIncident | CausalityIncidentRoot causeTimeline | Root causeSafetyIncident |