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| Criterion |  Operations Root Cause Analysis |  Innovation Brainstorming |  Innovation TRIZ |  Innovation Lotus Blossom |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | When a problem keeps recurring and the cause stays unclear, the method exposes the underlying mechanism. It separates symptom, guess, and robust explanation from one another. | When a team faces an open question with many obvious directions, the method first creates breadth instead of premature commitment. It separates idea flow from evaluation and makes lines of thought visible, creating a pool for selection and further development. | For technical contradictions or trade-offs, the method looks for solutions that resolve opposing requirements at the same time. It translates limits into an explicit picture of conflict that becomes workable. This produces not just compromises but more elegant principles. | When a central question feels too large, the method breaks it into neighboring topic fields with their own depth of ideation. It holds structure and openness at the same time, so adjacent perspectives don't get lost. This grows an idea space out of a core problem. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Low | High | Low |
Timedifferent | 1-4 h | 30-60 min | 1-4 h | 45-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 3-8 | 4-12 | 2-8 | 3-10 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Problem Statement, Cause Hypotheses, Confirmed Causes, Action Plan | Idea pool, Theme clusters, Shortlist | Contradiction Statement, Inventive Principles, Solution Concepts | Lotus Diagram, Idea Themes, Shortlist |
Tagsno overlap | Root causeProblem solvingQualityIncident | BrainstormingIdeationCreativityWorkshopDivergence | InnovationProblem solvingContradictionsCreativity | BrainstormingIdeationCreativityDivergenceWorkshop |