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| Criterion |  Engineering Fault Isolation |  Engineering Golden Path |  Operations Barrier Analysis |  Operations Causal Factor Analysis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | In technical failures, the visible symptom often gets mixed up with the actual cause. Fault Isolation narrows the fault space and progressively reduces which part of the system is truly affected. | When teams need a reliable default path for frequent use, sprawl quickly emerges without any guiding logic. Golden Path bundles the preferred path so good practice becomes easy and deviation becomes deliberate. | 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. | 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. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Medium | Medium | High |
Timedifferent | 30-180 min | 1-3 Tage Setup, laufend | 2-4 h | 2-6 h |
Participantsdifferent | 1-6 | 2-8 | 2-6 | 3-10 |
Formatsame | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Fault Isolation Map, Test Log, Excluded Hypotheses, Narrowed Fault Area | Golden Path Guide, Templates, Quality Checks | Barrier Inventory, Failure Analysis per Barrier, Action Backlog | Event Timeline, Causal Factor Chart, Cause List, Corrective Actions |
Tagsno overlap | TroubleshootingDiagnosisEngineering | EngineeringProductivityGovernance | Root causeSafetyIncident | CausalityIncidentRoot causeTimeline |