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| Criterion |  Decision Making Trade-off Analysis |  Operations Change Analysis |  Systems Thinking Current Reality Tree |  Operations Causal Factor Analysis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | 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. | For a deviation after a change, the method isolates the influence of the altered condition. It narrows down which differences are relevant and which are just accompanying noise. | A Current Reality Tree condenses many symptoms into a few causal chains. The method makes visible which core problems drive several negative effects at once. | For an event with a complicated course, the method breaks down the contributing factors along the timeline. It shows how conditions, decisions, and reactions together produce a course of events. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Medium | High | High |
Timedifferent | 45-120 min | 45-120 min | 2-6 h | 2-6 h |
Participantsdifferent | 2-8 | 2-6 | 3-8 | 3-10 |
Formatdifferent | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop | Workshop + async |
Outputdifferent | Trade-off Matrix, Criteria List, Decision Rationale, Accepted Downsides | Change Matrix, Cause Hypotheses, Validation Questions, Action List | Current Reality Tree, Core Problems, Intervention Ideas | Event Timeline, Causal Factor Chart, Cause List, Corrective Actions |
Tagsno overlap | TradeoffsDecisionCriteriaOptions | ChangeRoot causeTroubleshootingComparison | Systems thinkingRoot causeConstraintsCausality | CausalityIncidentRoot causeTimeline |