⛏️

How to … get to root causes

ask five whys
 
  1. A new release broke a key feature for customers. Why? Because a particular server failed.
  1. Why did the server fail? Because an obscure subsystem was used in the wrong way.
  1. Why was it used in the wrong way? The engineer who used it didn’t know how to use it properly.
  1. Why didn’t he know? Because he was never trained.
  1. Why wasn’t he trained? Because his manager doesn’t believe in training new engineers, because they are “too busy.”
 
Jefferson Memorial story
 
 
⛏️

How to … get to root causes

ask five whys
 
  1. A new release broke a key feature for customers. Why? Because a particular server failed.
  1. Why did the server fail? Because an obscure subsystem was used in the wrong way.
  1. Why was it used in the wrong way? The engineer who used it didn’t know how to use it properly.
  1. Why didn’t he know? Because he was never trained.
  1. Why wasn’t he trained? Because his manager doesn’t believe in training new engineers, because they are “too busy.”
 
Jefferson Memorial story