100% agreed....even many trainers & consultants are wrong..many use the fishbone with branches - using it to find root causes...fishbone is best used ONLY for PRIMARY 1st LEVEL CAUSES ...then to find root causes use 5Why.....Or use Tree Diagram which has ALL levels of causes from primary all the way to root causes
Yes , i agree with you , i try the fish bone to recognise thr root cause , you may lost , so its reasonable to start with as brainstorming then go to 5 why ,thanks for such effort
Thank you for sharing that, happy to hear that you enjoyed it. Wish you the best with your problem solving efforts. And don't hesitate to ask questions or suggest video topics 😉
Couldn't agree more. Teams inevitably get lost or distracted within 5-10 minutes. I have found it easier to create a table of the 6 categories of an Ishikawa diagram and brainstorm directly to the table (or 6 lists). Sometimes we will rank items within a category to determine which causes advance to further analysis.
@@BrentHarcey Absolutely, get the fishbone categories into tables immediately - that save on processing time and it eliminates the option of branching out too much. I like your approach of ranking the items within a category too. Don't forget to first eliminate the possible causes that are simply not true (that they came out of a brainstorm doesn't make them true, go to the shop floor or into the data to double-check). But after that, sure, trust your team's instinct to pick the most likely cause. And if that turns out not to solve the problem, just use that updated knowledge to pick the next best candidate cause.
This is really interesting. I'm glad I came across this video early in my exploration of root cause analysis and fishbone diagrams--I haven't seen the idea of putting untested hypotheses on the fishbone and then following up with them to determine if they get a root-cause analysis. Thanks for this nuance!
Only follow up those hypothesis that you've proven (or seriously expect to be) true. Thanks for your kind words, happy I could help you in your RCA journey.
It makes sense, buddy 😊 I believe you will extend your helping hands once I pop up with RCA issues... There is a lot to learn from this channel, really.
I like this in that it will help you identify what you need to solve for, or what to do a 5 why on. Is it Man, Method, Machine, Material... thanks for posting!
Thanks for sharing, I’m happy that my video was of value to you. If there’s any other topic you’d like me to cover, don’t hesitate to ask - I love posting things that are interesting to you 😉
I agree with you. I was thinking so before I watched your video on RUclips I think the 5 why process is what helps to identify the root cause of a problem; fishbone diagram is a visual representation of the 5 why process .
Yes, that’s an interesting way to describe to too. Although as far as visual representation goes, I’d advice using the fishbone for the first level of ‘causes’ and the traditional 5Why cascading boxes for the deeper level causes (so both visualizations). How does that ring for you? And which way of showing/sharing a 5 Why analysis with colleagues has had the best results for you?
My 5 cents. It's also possible to split the Fishbone diagram and move one or few categories to a separate Fishbone diagram. It will reduce the height of the graph and make it more usable and not so messy.
Hi! I did for a years such sort of analyses even without knowing theirs names) But I can definitely agree that Fishbone is a layer-1 concept and 5Whys is a layer-2.
The original Ishikawa fishbone was taught multi-layered, and you can use it that way of course, but the format just doesn’t support it. I’m all in favor of continuously improving our CI tools as well 😉
Hi Tom. I came to your video because im going to facilitate my frist RCA meeting in a few days and this looking for a good structure to conduct an efficient meeting. This was very helpfull and makes a lot of sense keeping the fishbone relatively simple and then zoom in on the points that the group agrees as most critical. I was thinking about a vote where each participant g’ets three votes each to place on a branch or three different branches or Two on one and another on a second, and let that resultat mark where we dive deeper into 5 whys. What so you Think about that?
Great idea - multi voting works really well to focus a group of people and make a choice without too much discussion. Make sure you let them vote for individual points/causes (e.g. for "feed belt misaligned"), not for the whole branch (i.e. not for "Machine"). Since you're in the ideal space for getting the maximum benefit from my course, I'll shamelessly plug that one too: www.tommentink.com/offers/qoZFo5wQ This is my Root Cause Problem Solving course, in which you'll learn how to take a team through the 6 steps needed to find a problem's root cause and solve it once and for all. Even if your company uses a different version of problem solving, the tools on the inside will be the same, so you'll still take massive benefit from the lessons on how to lead a group through a fishbone brainstorm, challenge on the quality of 5 why's, what clarifying questions to ask during problem definition, etc.
I agree with you, starting with Ishikawa to have an overview of the potential causes and deepvdive after with 5ws, givess us holistic view, so we don't mess up potential causes. Also it will be good before 5ws to make a poll with the team to stratify RC's. Could you please consider to do a video a about the leadership in problem solving, ¿? Greetings from Mexico.
I like the poll to stratify RC’s - that’s very close to what I mean with selecting the most likely RC’s with the team (from those that aren’t removed from the list after checking in the field, that is). Yes, RCPS leadership would be a nice topic for one or more videos. I’m also toying with the idea of making a mini course on that exact subject (more how to run/facilitate RCA/RCPS successfully, less on the technical workings/rules of the tools used). Thanks for letting me know what is interesting for you.
Today there are software that can allow 5 whys to be performed directly within fish bone diagram without concern with crowding the diagram. While the subsequent causes are being captured into the branches of each primary cause, the diagram will be auto adjusted and spacing. The brainstorming proces no longer restricted by the limitation of the size of the paper. The software basically provides a big canvas that allow fish bone diagram to expand in any of the branches. Additionally the software allows easy rearrangement of causes within own branch to arrive at logical flow of the analysis. Finally one can copy each verified root cause with all its effects along that branch away from the fish bone diagram onto a separate sheet (hard or soft) in 5 why root cause analysis which is presented in tabulated form.
That sounds pretty cool and useful - thanks for sharing. I am a bit sceptical, because that we can now get it onto one screen with better software doesn't always mean that it becomes clearer for participants - in the end, these are brainstorming and communication tools: we're not trying to capture as much as possible in as few documents as possible, but we're looking for the best tool to support our thinking and collaboration process. But don't let that hold you back from using it - there are plenty of digital tools that really did make live easier (it's just that for every successful one there seem to be at least 10 mind-clouding visual gadgets). What are your favourite fishbone/5 why apps?
Yes, of course you may still use the Fishbone, that's also the premise of this video - just try and get that 5 Why part outside of the Fishbone's visual. I would advice limiting how many 5 Why's you do - my general advice is to first check which assumptions in the Fishbone are true and then pick the 1 or 2 your team feels are most impactful to the problem -> start by diving into those with 5 Why before spending a lot of effort on deep diving all those minor causal factors. It's not a hard and fast rule, just advice to keep your Root Cause Analysis efforts more effective in 90+% of the cases.
The most effective method I know is to follow the instinct of the team: discuss which causes are most likely and follow up on 1 to 3 at a time. First try to prove if this effect (the potential cause) is actually happen in your process or not, then follow up with a 5-why. To keep this seemly random method from turning into a guessing game, make sure that the reasons to select a potential cause are discussed with the team working on the problem, not just chosen by one person. Also, focus on few potentials to follow up and move on quickly to a next candidate if this one wasn’t leading anywhere.
Happy you like the video and the template, I hope you get great use out of it. I know, maybe I should set up a small store of useful templates, but I'd also be happy if people like and share the videos and maybe purchase one of my courses from time to time - that allows me to keep providing free content for the whole community.
Hey, I see I'm not alone with this topic...what I do is to skip the M-branches and name them directly with the issue...because mostly the issues are a mixture of the Ms....
So the more traditional way to do a fishbone is to label the branches to broaden your brainstorm scope, with the 4 Ms being very popular in manufacturing, service and marketing often use their 5 P or 8 P model and programming has a different 5 P model - they are all just ways to force us to think about different aspects of our business and not pigeonhole into one line of thinking from the start. But indeed, you don’t have to use any predefined categories - if you already have some knowledge of the basic causes and which of them combined were needed to trigger your problem, then using them as categories can be especially powerful. Anything to encourage a good brainstorm and get you and your team thinking about all matters that should be explored 😀
Thanks for the feedback - for my newer videos I found a way to edit the sound and greatly reduce the annoyance of the marker’s sound. My apologies for this one, the screeching is pretty bad 😵💫
Thanks for sharing that. Glad to see that you like the video. If there’s any other topic or question you’d like me to cover, I love making request video’s 😉
I never understood why they always said it's for Root Cause.. Gets so messy and it's obviously more a categorization tool.. A hybrid of 5 Why and Affinity ...
It works very nicely in THE BIGGER SCOPE of a finding and solving root causes, but I also don’t see how we often get Fishbone and 5 Why as ‘a choice between the two’ - they’re different beasts...
Thanks for the feedback Nicholas. I had noticed this squeaky sound come through the mic to much (especially when watching with headphones on), so in more recent videos I’ve been editing down the sound when I’m writing things on the flip chart. I’d appreciate it if you’d also check some of my recent videos (I feel that completely turning off the sound when writing also gives an unnatural effect) - if the sound is still giving you the nasty chills, please let me know, so that I can tone down the sound more. On a side note: what do you think would be needed for you to share my videos with colleagues or fellow student of performance excellence?
Haha, yes, I did. In fact they are refillable markers, so I bought myself a refill set and now they’re writing fine again. Came to love those Neuland markers - many others write worse than what you see in this video even when there fresh out the box 🤷♂️
@@thomasgoetz8178 yeah, maybe it’s time to make a new version of that video - I’m not sure it will come out as nice and natural content-wise, but the sound will definitely be better with my new setup. (I tried post editing this video, but that didn’t have the desired effect, unfortunately)
If you're interested in my 6-step problem solving template, it's available for free through this link: www.tommentink.com/problemsolvingtemplate
100% agreed....even many trainers & consultants are wrong..many use the fishbone with branches - using it to find root causes...fishbone is best used ONLY for PRIMARY 1st LEVEL CAUSES ...then to find root causes use 5Why.....Or use Tree Diagram which has ALL levels of causes from primary all the way to root causes
Yes , i agree with you , i try the fish bone to recognise thr root cause , you may lost , so its reasonable to start with as brainstorming then go to 5 why ,thanks for such effort
Agreed. It’s a *high-level* way of dissecting a problem.
I agree with you, excelent explanation.
Thank you for sharing that, happy to hear that you enjoyed it. Wish you the best with your problem solving efforts. And don't hesitate to ask questions or suggest video topics 😉
Couldn't agree more. Teams inevitably get lost or distracted within 5-10 minutes. I have found it easier to create a table of the 6 categories of an Ishikawa diagram and brainstorm directly to the table (or 6 lists). Sometimes we will rank items within a category to determine which causes advance to further analysis.
Ah. Just looking over your form and see you use the same tabular approach.
@@BrentHarcey Absolutely, get the fishbone categories into tables immediately - that save on processing time and it eliminates the option of branching out too much.
I like your approach of ranking the items within a category too. Don't forget to first eliminate the possible causes that are simply not true (that they came out of a brainstorm doesn't make them true, go to the shop floor or into the data to double-check). But after that, sure, trust your team's instinct to pick the most likely cause. And if that turns out not to solve the problem, just use that updated knowledge to pick the next best candidate cause.
This is really interesting. I'm glad I came across this video early in my exploration of root cause analysis and fishbone diagrams--I haven't seen the idea of putting untested hypotheses on the fishbone and then following up with them to determine if they get a root-cause analysis. Thanks for this nuance!
Only follow up those hypothesis that you've proven (or seriously expect to be) true.
Thanks for your kind words, happy I could help you in your RCA journey.
It makes sense, buddy 😊
I believe you will extend your helping hands once I pop up with RCA issues...
There is a lot to learn from this channel, really.
Makes whole lots of sense. I wish college professors can teach the topic this way.
@@oladipupoodutayo7080 thank you for those kind words. I have actually seen some of my videos shared on university websites, so some professors do 😊
I like this in that it will help you identify what you need to solve for, or what to do a 5 why on. Is it Man, Method, Machine, Material... thanks for posting!
Thanks for sharing, I’m happy that my video was of value to you.
If there’s any other topic you’d like me to cover, don’t hesitate to ask - I love posting things that are interesting to you 😉
Never thought about it from this angle. thank you!
That’s why learning is life-long 😃
Glad you found some inspiration in my video. Thanks for sharing.
Fishbone Diagram is used for initial brainstorming. And 5 why tool is used for root cause analysis.
Absolutely - that's how to use the Fishbone effectively in the whole RCA process.
I agree with you. I was thinking so before I watched your video on RUclips
I think the 5 why process is what helps to identify the root cause of a problem; fishbone diagram is a visual representation of the 5 why process .
Yes, that’s an interesting way to describe to too. Although as far as visual representation goes, I’d advice using the fishbone for the first level of ‘causes’ and the traditional 5Why cascading boxes for the deeper level causes (so both visualizations).
How does that ring for you?
And which way of showing/sharing a 5 Why analysis with colleagues has had the best results for you?
My 5 cents. It's also possible to split the Fishbone diagram and move one or few categories to a separate Fishbone diagram. It will reduce the height of the graph and make it more usable and not so messy.
Yep - if that works to clear your though process, and more importantly share the thought process with others, then it’s a good improvement
Hi! I did for a years such sort of analyses even without knowing theirs names) But I can definitely agree that Fishbone is a layer-1 concept and 5Whys is a layer-2.
The original Ishikawa fishbone was taught multi-layered, and you can use it that way of course, but the format just doesn’t support it.
I’m all in favor of continuously improving our CI tools as well 😉
@@TomMentink btw, I can't find any information about Ishikawa and Fishbone difference. All the time those names are used as synonymous.
Agreed, It was well explained. Thank you
Hi Tom. I came to your video because im going to facilitate my frist RCA meeting in a few days and this looking for a good structure to conduct an efficient meeting. This was very helpfull and makes a lot of sense keeping the fishbone relatively simple and then zoom in on the points that the group agrees as most critical. I was thinking about a vote where each participant g’ets three votes each to place on a branch or three different branches or Two on one and another on a second, and let that resultat mark where we dive deeper into 5 whys. What so you Think about that?
Great idea - multi voting works really well to focus a group of people and make a choice without too much discussion. Make sure you let them vote for individual points/causes (e.g. for "feed belt misaligned"), not for the whole branch (i.e. not for "Machine").
Since you're in the ideal space for getting the maximum benefit from my course, I'll shamelessly plug that one too: www.tommentink.com/offers/qoZFo5wQ
This is my Root Cause Problem Solving course, in which you'll learn how to take a team through the 6 steps needed to find a problem's root cause and solve it once and for all. Even if your company uses a different version of problem solving, the tools on the inside will be the same, so you'll still take massive benefit from the lessons on how to lead a group through a fishbone brainstorm, challenge on the quality of 5 why's, what clarifying questions to ask during problem definition, etc.
I agree with you, starting with Ishikawa to have an overview of the potential causes and deepvdive after with 5ws, givess us holistic view, so we don't mess up potential causes. Also it will be good before 5ws to make a poll with the team to stratify RC's.
Could you please consider to do a video a about the leadership in problem solving, ¿?
Greetings from Mexico.
I like the poll to stratify RC’s - that’s very close to what I mean with selecting the most likely RC’s with the team (from those that aren’t removed from the list after checking in the field, that is).
Yes, RCPS leadership would be a nice topic for one or more videos. I’m also toying with the idea of making a mini course on that exact subject (more how to run/facilitate RCA/RCPS successfully, less on the technical workings/rules of the tools used). Thanks for letting me know what is interesting for you.
Yes agree with you
Love this. Thanks to you I've learnt something new today!
Life long learning - the basis for continuous improvement for people 😀
Glad to see that you liked it.
Today there are software that can allow 5 whys to be performed directly within fish bone diagram without concern with crowding the diagram. While the subsequent causes are being captured into the branches of each primary cause, the diagram will be auto adjusted and spacing. The brainstorming proces no longer restricted by the limitation of the size of the paper. The software basically provides a big canvas that allow fish bone diagram to expand in any of the branches. Additionally the software allows easy rearrangement of causes within own branch to arrive at logical flow of the analysis. Finally one can copy each verified root cause with all its effects along that branch away from the fish bone diagram onto a separate sheet (hard or soft) in 5 why root cause analysis which is presented in tabulated form.
That sounds pretty cool and useful - thanks for sharing.
I am a bit sceptical, because that we can now get it onto one screen with better software doesn't always mean that it becomes clearer for participants - in the end, these are brainstorming and communication tools: we're not trying to capture as much as possible in as few documents as possible, but we're looking for the best tool to support our thinking and collaboration process.
But don't let that hold you back from using it - there are plenty of digital tools that really did make live easier (it's just that for every successful one there seem to be at least 10 mind-clouding visual gadgets).
What are your favourite fishbone/5 why apps?
Good suggestion. it will also make it easier to document using a word processor rather than having to get and maybe learn a diagramming tool.
Nice insight, I love it - anything that makes it easier to just use pen/paper or simple software is a win in my book
Loved it Tom, thanks
Glad to hear that!
If you ever have questions or ideas for a future video - do tell, I love making videos based on what you need 😃
Tom, you may still use Fishbone. Ideally if there are multiple problem areas, you will have to create that many 5 why's !!!
Yes, of course you may still use the Fishbone, that's also the premise of this video - just try and get that 5 Why part outside of the Fishbone's visual.
I would advice limiting how many 5 Why's you do - my general advice is to first check which assumptions in the Fishbone are true and then pick the 1 or 2 your team feels are most impactful to the problem -> start by diving into those with 5 Why before spending a lot of effort on deep diving all those minor causal factors. It's not a hard and fast rule, just advice to keep your Root Cause Analysis efforts more effective in 90+% of the cases.
How we can decide. Which one goes for further analysis and which on we can reject. Is their any method to do that
The most effective method I know is to follow the instinct of the team: discuss which causes are most likely and follow up on 1 to 3 at a time. First try to prove if this effect (the potential cause) is actually happen in your process or not, then follow up with a 5-why.
To keep this seemly random method from turning into a guessing game, make sure that the reasons to select a potential cause are discussed with the team working on the problem, not just chosen by one person. Also, focus on few potentials to follow up and move on quickly to a next candidate if this one wasn’t leading anywhere.
Make perfect sense. Thanks for sharing 👍
Thank you so much Tom! I feel honored to be able to utilize your template. (You know people pay money for this stuff, right?) :)
Happy you like the video and the template, I hope you get great use out of it.
I know, maybe I should set up a small store of useful templates, but I'd also be happy if people like and share the videos and maybe purchase one of my courses from time to time - that allows me to keep providing free content for the whole community.
Totally agree with you.
Hey, I see I'm not alone with this topic...what I do is to skip the M-branches and name them directly with the issue...because mostly the issues are a mixture of the Ms....
So the more traditional way to do a fishbone is to label the branches to broaden your brainstorm scope, with the 4 Ms being very popular in manufacturing, service and marketing often use their 5 P or 8 P model and programming has a different 5 P model - they are all just ways to force us to think about different aspects of our business and not pigeonhole into one line of thinking from the start.
But indeed, you don’t have to use any predefined categories - if you already have some knowledge of the basic causes and which of them combined were needed to trigger your problem, then using them as categories can be especially powerful.
Anything to encourage a good brainstorm and get you and your team thinking about all matters that should be explored 😀
Excellent video!
Thanks John.
If you ever have questions or future video ideas, please do tell. And in the mean time I hope you’ll enjoy more of my videos 😊
100% agree!
THANK YOU!!!!!!!
solid idea!
Thanks for sharing that feedback, hope you enjoy my videos!
U are correct
Simple in its brevity, thanks for the support
Love this!!!!
Thanks for the sharing. BTW please consider a new board/marker for writing. The screeching sound is unbearable 😑
Thanks for the feedback - for my newer videos I found a way to edit the sound and greatly reduce the annoyance of the marker’s sound. My apologies for this one, the screeching is pretty bad 😵💫
Great video !!
Thanks!
Agreed. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing that. Glad to see that you like the video.
If there’s any other topic or question you’d like me to cover, I love making request video’s 😉
I never understood why they always said it's for Root Cause.. Gets so messy and it's obviously more a categorization tool.. A hybrid of 5 Why and Affinity ...
It works very nicely in THE BIGGER SCOPE of a finding and solving root causes, but I also don’t see how we often get Fishbone and 5 Why as ‘a choice between the two’ - they’re different beasts...
Huge thank you!!!
Glad you liked it.
Do let me know what other topics you’d liked to learn about. I’ll think of how to explain those in a next video.
The sound your marker makes gives me chills and not in a good way 😂
Thanks for the feedback Nicholas. I had noticed this squeaky sound come through the mic to much (especially when watching with headphones on), so in more recent videos I’ve been editing down the sound when I’m writing things on the flip chart. I’d appreciate it if you’d also check some of my recent videos (I feel that completely turning off the sound when writing also gives an unnatural effect) - if the sound is still giving you the nasty chills, please let me know, so that I can tone down the sound more.
On a side note: what do you think would be needed for you to share my videos with colleagues or fellow student of performance excellence?
You need to change your marker
Haha, yes, I did. In fact they are refillable markers, so I bought myself a refill set and now they’re writing fine again.
Came to love those Neuland markers - many others write worse than what you see in this video even when there fresh out the box 🤷♂️
Helemaal mee eens
Unfortunately I had to stop this video as the sound of the pen scratching the paper is unbearable.
@@thomasgoetz8178 yeah, maybe it’s time to make a new version of that video - I’m not sure it will come out as nice and natural content-wise, but the sound will definitely be better with my new setup. (I tried post editing this video, but that didn’t have the desired effect, unfortunately)