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| Criterion |  Architecture Software Architecture Canvas |  Decision Making Pre-Mortem |  Product Discovery Assumption Mapping |  Decision Making Assumption Surfacing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | The Software Architecture Canvas reduces a system to the most important architecture decisions, constraints, and interfaces. It is useful when teams need a resilient overall picture quickly. | 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 assumptions still sit unordered in the room, it weighs uncertainty against leverage. It makes visible which hypotheses should be checked first. | 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. |
Complexitydifferent | Low | Low | Medium | Low |
Timedifferent | 1-2 h | 20–45 min | 45-60 min | 45-90 min |
Participantsdifferent | 3-10 | Small cross-functional group | 2-8 | 2-8 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop | Workshop | Workshop + async | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Architecture Canvas, Goals, Constraints, Quality Attributes | Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption log | Assumption map, Test backlog, Risk ranking | Assumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan |
Tagsno overlap | CanvasArchitectureAlignmentWorkshop | RiskDecisionFailurePlanning | AssumptionsRiskExperimentsValidation | AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery |