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Criterion
A hypothetical failure makes concrete risks, signals, and fitting mitigations visible.
Decision Making
Pre-Mortem
Paper illustration for Smoke Test.
Product Discovery
Smoke Test
Paper illustration of an assumption matrix with prioritized test cards
Decision Making
Assumption Surfacing
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.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.Plans often contain assumptions that were never openly stated and remain dangerous precisely because of that. Assumption Surfacing makes these silent premises visible and prioritizes which of them carry the initiative or could sink it.
Complexitysame
LowLowLow
Timedifferent
20–45 min1-5 Tage45-90 min
Participantsdifferent
Small cross-functional groupNutzertraffic2-8
Formatdifferent
WorkshopAsyncWorkshop + async
Outputdifferent
Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption logInterest Metrics, Conversion Signal, Learning NoteAssumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan
Tagsno overlap
RiskDecisionFailurePlanning
ValidationExperimentsDemandGrowth
AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery
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Often compared together

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
Paper illustration of Riskiest Assumption Test with a method-specific labelled workspace.
Product Discovery
Riskiest Assumption Test