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Criterion
A hypothetical failure makes concrete risks, signals, and fitting mitigations visible.
Decision Making
Pre-Mortem
Paper illustration for Causal Factor Analysis.
Operations
Causal Factor Analysis
Paper illustration for Smoke Test.
Product Discovery
Smoke Test
Purposedifferent
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.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.When demand only needs to be roughly verified, it tests interest with minimal effort. It measures whether people would take a next step at all.
Complexitydifferent
LowHighLow
Timedifferent
20–45 min2-6 h1-5 Tage
Participantsdifferent
Small cross-functional group3-10Nutzertraffic
Formatdifferent
WorkshopWorkshop + asyncAsync
Outputdifferent
Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption logEvent Timeline, Causal Factor Chart, Cause List, Corrective ActionsInterest Metrics, Conversion Signal, Learning Note
Tagsno overlap
RiskDecisionFailurePlanning
CausalityIncidentRoot causeTimeline
ValidationExperimentsDemandGrowth
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Methods with strong topical overlap with the current selection, not yet in the comparison.

Paper illustration of a calm four-quadrant Assumption Map with hypothesis cards and emphasis on important assumptions with little evidence.
Product Discovery
Assumption Mapping
Paper illustration for Fake Door Test
Product Discovery
Fake Door Test