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| Criterion |  Systems Thinking Evaporating Cloud |  Facilitation Stakeholder Mapping |  Agile Bucket System |  Agile Affinity Estimation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | The method makes visible why two seemingly incompatible demands arise and which assumption must be tested to resolve the conflict. | When an initiative depends on many people, interests, and power dynamics, Stakeholder Mapping systematically orders the environment. It shows who influences, who is affected, and where relationship management or safeguarding matters first. | When a large batch of work needs a fast, rough estimate, it sorts items into predefined size buckets. It sorts work by value, risk, and delivery ability. The result is captured as a Bucketed Backlog, Relative Estimates, and Split Candidates. | When many tasks need to be classified quickly, it sorts them by perceived effort and similarity. It reduces the effort of fine-grained estimation for large volumes. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Low | Medium | Medium |
Timedifferent | 60-120 min | 60–90 min | 30-90 min | 30-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | 2-8 | 3-12 | 3-12 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Conflict Cloud, Assumption List, Breakthrough Ideas, Next Experiments | Stakeholder Map, Engagement Plan, Risk Notes | Bucketed Backlog, Relative Estimates, Split Candidates | Affinity Size Map, Grouped Estimates, Unclear Items |
Tagsno overlap | Theory of ConstraintsAssumptionsSystems thinking | StakeholdersAlignmentFacilitationChange | EstimationBacklogRelative sizing | EstimationBacklogRelative sizing |