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| Criterion |  Decision Making Pre-Mortem |  Architecture SAAM (Software Architecture Analysis Method) |  Architecture Risk Storming |  Product Discovery Assumption Mapping |
|---|---|---|---|---|
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. | SAAM helps teams judge an architecture’s suitability for selected tasks and changes. It is particularly useful for examining modifiability and comparing architecture alternatives with clear reasoning. | Helps clarify architecture context, options, and consequences in concrete terms. It organizes technical context, alternatives, and consequences. The result is captured as an Annotated Diagram, a Prioritized Risk List, and an Action Backlog. | When assumptions still sit unordered in the room, it weighs uncertainty against leverage. It makes visible which hypotheses should be checked first. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | High | Low | Medium |
Timedifferent | 20–45 min | Preparation, scenario analysis, and findings review; effort depends on scope | 60-90 min | 45-60 min |
Participantsdifferent | Small cross-functional group | Architecture experts and stakeholders for scenarios and weighting | 4-12 | 2-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption log | Domain functions mapped to components and connections, Quality attributes and evaluation criteria, Typical tasks and their effects on the architecture, Reasoned evaluation or comparison of alternatives | Annotated Diagram, Prioritized Risk List, Action Backlog | Assumption map, Test backlog, Risk ranking |
Tagsno overlap | RiskDecisionFailurePlanning | ArchitectureChangeAnalysisComparisonQuality | RiskArchitectureWorkshopValidation | AssumptionsRiskExperimentsValidation |