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| Criterion |  Engineering Golden Path |  Innovation Design Thinking |  Innovation Lean Startup |  Architecture ARID (Active Reviews for Intermediate Designs) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | 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 complex user problems with an uncertain cause, the method connects observation, interpretation, and experiment into a learning cycle. It keeps the focus on real needs and avoids premature solution language. This produces robust decisions for product and service. | For uncertain business assumptions, the method forces the idea into contact with real market reactions early. It separates wishful picture, assumption, and observable behavior, so that learning becomes faster than planning. This translates uncertainty into measurable insight. | 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. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | High | Medium | Medium |
Timedifferent | 1-3 Tage Setup, laufend | 1 Tag bis mehrere Wochen | Wochen bis Monate je Lernzyklus | 2–4 h review as a planning range; preparation and evaluation additional |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | 4-10 | 2-8 | Designers, developers as users, and facilitation |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Golden Path Guide, Templates, Quality Checks | Problem Statement, Prototype, Test Learnings | Hypothesis list, MVPs, Learning reports, Pivot or persevere decision | Prioritized development tasks, Jointly produced code or pseudocode, Observed difficulties and open design questions, Proposed design revisions |
Tagsno overlap | EngineeringProductivityGovernance | InnovationPrototypeResearch | LeanStartupValidationMVP | ArchitectureEngineeringFeedbackValidationTasks |