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| Criterion |  Systems Thinking Futures Wheel |  Decision Making Pre-Mortem |  Decision Making Constraint Analysis |  Systems Thinking Current Reality Tree |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | The Futures Wheel helps explore the consequences of a decision, a trend, or a strategic move in a structured way. It makes visible which first, second, and third-order effects could arise from an event. | 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. | A Current Reality Tree condenses many symptoms into a few causal chains. The method makes visible which core problems drive several negative effects at once. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Low | Low | High |
Timedifferent | 60-120 min | 20–45 min | 30-90 min | 2-6 h |
Participantsdifferent | 3-10 | Small cross-functional group | 2-8 | 3-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Futures Wheel, Consequence Chains, Strategic Signals | Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption log | Constraint List, Hard/Soft Classification, Option Impact Notes, Decision Boundaries | Current Reality Tree, Core Problems, Intervention Ideas |
Tagsno overlap | ForesightSystems thinkingSignals | RiskDecisionFailurePlanning | ConstraintsDecisionPlanningOptions | Systems thinkingRoot causeConstraintsCausality |