Five Whys and Wishbone: Program and Training Sponsorship

Friday, 18 May 2018 by Shon Isenhour

Over the years I have seen many sponsors give great supporting speeches but I have also noted a few that failed miserably along the way. Lets learn from them. One in particular was the kick off of a new root cause analysis facilitators program in a facility with a history of " flavor of the month" programs and lack luster performance. The "leader" did not attend the workshop because he was...

Five Why "Nots": 5 Reasons Why Reliability Engineers Should Use More Than 5 Whys for Root Cause Analysis

Tuesday, 05 September 2017 by Shon Isenhour

First of all let's talk about what Five Whys is before we mention what it is not. It is a problem solving tool used in many facilities and is commonly associated with Lean, Six Sigma and Kaizen implementations. The technique was originally developed by Sakichi Toyoda and was used within the Toyota Motor Corporation during the evolution of its manufacturing methodologies. The method is quite...

Transitional Root Cause Analysis

Monday, 28 August 2017 by Shon Isenhour

When I discuss RCA I use a method called Transitional Root Cause Analysis or TRCA for short.

It is made up of 10 tools that can be explained and understood in a very short period of time.

In the next few minutes I will demonstrate both the simplicity and rules for use for 3 of the 10 and explain why we consider them transitional in nature.

In this blog we will use what I categorize as the tree...

Seven Reasons Why Your RCA is Not Getting Results

Thursday, 10 August 2017 by Shon Isenhour

Root Cause Analysis (RCA) can be a very powerful tool for eliminating defects and increasing efficiency and profits. I have noticed seven common pitfalls that prevent practitioners from getting maximum value from their RCA efforts. Below is a brief look at each of them.

1) Not digging deep enough into the problem.

This manifest itself as either getting stuck on the physical causes which leads to...

"Somebody's Fault Tree" The Ultimate Guide to Playing the RCA Blame Game

Friday, 04 August 2017 by Shon Isenhour
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