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| Criterion |  Decision Making Decision Tree |  Architecture ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs) |  Decision Making Pre-Mortem |  Decision Making Constraint Analysis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | For decisions with follow-on paths and dependencies, a linear comparison is often not enough. A Decision Tree shows how options branch under conditions and which consequences hang on each branch. | ARID examines how well developers can work with a technical design. It focuses on a part of the system that can still be revised, between the architecture overview and the detailed specification. | In early initiatives with many uncertainties, planning quickly turns too optimistic. A pre-mortem makes the expected failure visible in advance and sharpens the view of causes, gaps, and countermeasures. | When an initiative stalls, the limit often lies not in the idea but in hard or soft boundary conditions. Constraint Analysis separates these limits and shows which of them can actually be shaped. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Medium | Low | Low |
Timedifferent | 30-90 min | 2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional | 20–45 min | 30-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 1-6 | Designers, developers as users, and facilitation | Small cross-functional group | 2-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Decision Tree, Option Map, Assumption List | Prioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisions | Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption log | Constraint List, Hard/Soft Classification, Option Impact Notes, Decision Boundaries |
Tagsno overlap | DecisionTreeOptions | ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks | RiskDecisionFailurePlanning | ConstraintsDecisionPlanningOptions |