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Criterion
A hypothetical failure makes concrete risks, signals, and fitting mitigations visible.
Decision Making
Pre-Mortem
Paper illustration for Trade-off Analysis.
Decision Making
Trade-off Analysis
Paper illustration of Request for Comments (RFC) with its method-specific working model.
Architecture
Request for Comments
Paper illustration: scenarios and architectural decisions are connected to identified risks.
Architecture
ATAM (Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method)
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.With limited resources, quality, speed, cost, and risk almost always compete with each other. Trade-off Analysis makes these tensions explicit and prevents decisions from producing hidden side effects.An RFC clarifies architecture context, options, and consequences. It structures technical context, alternatives, tradeoffs, open questions, and review feedback, and captures the result as an RFC document, reviewer comments, and a decision rationale.ATAM helps teams weigh architecture decisions when quality goals compete. The team considers business goals, stakeholder expectations, and technical decisions together. The evaluation shows which risks need further investigation.
Complexitydifferent
LowMediumMediumHigh
Timedifferent
20–45 min45-120 min1-3 Wochen vom Draft bis zur EntscheidungSeveral meetings plus preparation and analysis; total effort depends on scope
Participantsdifferent
Small cross-functional group2-83-20 ReviewerEvaluation team, architects, and relevant stakeholders
Formatdifferent
WorkshopWorkshop + asyncAsyncWorkshop + async
Outputdifferent
Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption logTrade-off Matrix, Criteria List, Decision Rationale, Accepted DownsidesRFC document, Reviewer comments, Decision rationale, Follow-up ADR or ticketsPrioritized quality scenarios in a utility tree, Architecture risks with reasoning and assumptions, Sensitivity and trade-off points, Findings report with open investigations
Tagsno overlap
RiskDecisionFailurePlanning
TradeoffsDecisionCriteriaOptions
ArchitectureDecisionAsyncGovernance
ArchitectureQualityRiskTradeoffsStakeholders
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