Approach to Finding the Root Cause of Failures

blocher · 2020-03-31T15:34:34+00:00

Another topic that I hope can elicit engineering discussion: What makes up a good skill set for finding the root cause of a failure that is rare, intermittent or obscure? Over the past several years I have been more involved in root cause failure than I was when I was doing more design work. In many ways I think it is more challenging than design work. It takes a mindset that is different t han design. Here is my reminder list when doing root cause studies 1. never root for a particular outcome when performing a test. Root for no t being fooled by the results of your test 2. Assign weighting factors to everything you believe. Never assign a weig hting factor of 1 to anything until you know you have the problem solved 3. Expect to have to do certain tests over again and that you will draw an opposite conclusion when you repeat a test than what you concluded after th e first test. 4. Taking guidance from "helpful" outsiders is challenging. On the one had they care and are smart, on the other hand if you go about chasing other p eoples ideas (often conceived of to just demonstrate they are concerned in a meeting) you will never get an a clear path to troubleshoot the problem i n your own way. Help is a two edged sword. It is important but can sometimes be problemat ic. 5. As an aside - I have learned that when I "see something" during the desi gn phase, I no longer look at that as a curse, but as a blessing. It is go ing to come back and get you later. 6. Get past the notion that having nothing to show for a days work is bad. As a designer you can show a days work for a days pay. In root cause you feel like you have accomplished nothing for a long time. Frequently, thoug h , these problems are the most visible problems in an organization and can make a difference between losing a customer and keeping one. 7. Look for contradictions in your thinking. Use other people to help you find contradictions in your thinking. OK - enough for now......

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mpm 6 years ago

he backlog in toilet paper will fund things for some time. ...

So here's the thing: I'm hoping you are correct and the world economy reco vers / rebounds post-Corona, or at least, once we can get a better handle o n managing the pandemic.

OR...

Will employers struggling to stay afloat via layoffs (etc..) find new ways to work more efficiently, and as a result, NOT re-hire staff? (Here, I'm t hinking investment in automation, consolidation of departments, etc.. - whe rever you can find efficiencies that don't have an additional payroll or 40

1k attached to it.)

Will tele-medicine become the new normal? What about education? Is the "30 kids in a box" model under fire with all these school closures? Fewer teachers? fewer schools? fewer companies to p rint textbooks? Coronavirus could (by force) answer difficult questions fo r us, that industry may have preferred not to ask. (Think: Teachers unions. )

FWIW: Where I work, we've layed-off (laid-off?) a few workers, and my gues s is we won't re-hire / fill those positions post-Coronavirus.

One more thought: Who's to say that workers (as a whole) go back to work where they came from (for those who lost their jobs)? After the big "re-shuffle" of employees, is it fair to say they all find employment? (Here, I'm thinking from a sk illset perspective, but clearly some small businesses will never recover an d those jobs will be lost).

I realize the macro-economy is much larger than a few textbooks and employe e musical chairs, but I also wonder if there are any (thus far) hidden obst acles to getting a $22T economy up and running. (After all, it seems to ta ke a lot to kill one!)

But alas, my reason for asking is selfish enough: I've got my eye on about 15 stocks that will ("famous last words") rebound significantly after this Coronavirus. But as of this week, they are all still in free-fall, or mos tly so. A few are depressed enough I could buy now, even if not at their r espective rock-bottom prices, and still feel good about it - since I could probably hold on to them as long as needed (within reason).

Note importantly that NO CRUISE LINES are on that list. I may be mistaken, but I think vacationers will pull the plug on that indus try for the foreseeable future. The Titanic would offer a better experienc e, and probably have a better ROI too.

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mpm 6 years ago

Sloman finally admits he's not intelligently designed. :)

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Bill Sloman 6 years ago

None of us were. Don't you understand anything about evolution?

Bill Sloman, Sydney

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Michael Terrell 6 years ago

Well, he is a poorly evolved APE!

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blocher 6 years ago

The fool has said in his heart that there is no God

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Bill Sloman 6 years ago

Like everybody else who posts here. Of course there's quite a lot of diversity in what our evolution producted. Everybody can talk, and the people who post here can read and write as well, but some of them don't think very clearly.

Bill Sloman, Sydney

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Bill Sloman 6 years ago

Agnostics merely say that there's no convincing evidence one way or the other.

Bill Sloman, Sydney

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jlarkin 6 years ago

He was designed by an especially dull and tedious being, on a bad day.

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc Science teaches us to doubt. Claude Bernard

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blocher 6 years ago

Your position that intelligent design is irrational takes the agnostic position off the table.

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Bill Sloman 6 years ago

Sadly for John Larkin's reputation, I wasn't designed at all, and neither was anybody else - we just evolved, and are the consequence of an essentially random shuffling within the fairly narrow range of genetic possibilities our parents had to offer.

This may not be too different from the sort of design process that John Larkin seems to manage, but most of us can do better (at least on a good day).

Bill Sloman, Sydney

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Ricky C 6 years ago

te:

notice where we were screwing it up.

ther.

No one can dispute that. God was created to be unprovable either way. But the existence of an all-powerful, omniscient being does create contradicti ons, not to mention the inherent contradiction of man having free will in a universe with such a being. But you can believe in God without believing man has free will.

Ricky C. +-- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging +-- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

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Ricky C 6 years ago

Not really, two different issues, believing in God and believing God created man.

Rick C. +-+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging +-+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

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David Brown 6 years ago

It's fine to say "I believe in God, and that he created evolution" - that strikes me as a lot more flattering to him than suggesting he created the flawed human race.

There is also the possibility that there was a designer, but that he/she/it was not intelligent.

There are so many obvious and simple mistakes and bad designs in biology that there clearly was no "intelligent designer" - or that he/she/it was having a laugh. I mean, what designer could have put together the mammalian brain but routed the recurrent laryngeal nerve on the wrong side of the aortic arch? /That/ is simply not credible.

Perhaps some parts of biology were created by the Flying Spaghetti Monster after a particularly heavy session at the beer fountain?

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mpm 6 years ago

Another un-provable possibility is that the concept of "god" is just another inherent property of matter, like density, color, mass, length, temperature, etc...

I recall Scott Adams (creator of the Dilbert cartoons) once wrote a book along those lines.

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Ricky C 6 years ago

rote:

:

notice where we were screwing it up.

he other.

position off the table.

eated man.

Did you give that any thought at all? If there is a all knowing God, would he have set up evolution without knowing the sort of human race that would result??? Or are you suggesting he created evolution as a sort of experim ent just to see what might happen? Again, why would he not know???

Huh? You mean a universe designed by something equivalent to humans???

Arrrgggg!

Ricky C. ++- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging ++- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

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Ricky C 6 years ago

As long as it can not be proven or disproven, then it can't possibly have any impact on my life, so it can't matter to me.

Rick C. +++ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging +++ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

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Phil Allison 6 years ago

-----------------------O

** There was an agnostic dyslexic who believed there was no Dog.

.... Phil

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Clifford Heath 6 years ago

Non-theists say that the word "God" is so ill-defined that question of existence cannot be meaningfully asked, let alone answered.

It's just like asking whether unicorns exist. The idea of a unicorn is the intersection of two categories (horse-like creatures, creatures with a single horn), both of which contain concrete instances - but the intersection contains no concrete instance. Therefore the word "unicorn" applies only to the empty category formed by the intersection, and is not made real by any instance. There can be no actual answer to any question about a non-actual thing. "God" is like that.

CH

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DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno 6 years ago

Phil Allison wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com:

Is that Dogmic Karma or Karmic Dogma?

These are the times that try mens' holes.

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Ricky C 6 years ago

You got that wrong. The agnostic dyslexic stayed awake at night wondering if there really was a Dog. If he didn't believe he would be an atheist dyslexic and that doesn't have the 'g' in it which helps the humor.

Humorous letters are 'g', 'k', 'p' and lets not forget the sometimes funny 'x' and 'z'.

Gadzooks! A gherkin kerfuffle in Punxsutawney!

Even got the 'x' and 'z' in that one!

Rick C. ---- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging ---- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

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Approach to Finding the Root Cause of Failures

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