How Technology Can Assist in Conducting Root Cause Analysis?

What does it mean to Conduct a Root Cause Analysis (RCA)?

The process of finding the underlying reason behind an issue, also referred to as Root Cause Analysis (RCA), allows for the matter to be solved by determining what caused it in the first place. It’s a technique for solving problems that produce the use of information analysis, discussion, and various tools to analyze the signs and symptoms of an issue so as to induce the basis of the matter. It’s not enough to easily identify the unspecified factors that will have contributed to a problem; rather, it’s necessary to spot the issue’s actual root cause so as to prevent it from happening again.

If a difficulty arises within your manufacturing processes, your top priority should be to resolve the difficulty and obtain everything back to operating normally as soon as possible. While this is often occurring, you must also attempt to determine what caused the difficulty in the first place so you’ll avoid it happening again in the future.

There are many possible explanations for why something went wrong. It’s possible that there was a controversy with the materials or the equipment, an inefficient work process, a scarcity of visibility into a process at the organization, inappropriate adherence to plain operating procedures (SOPs), or a system failure.

Unluckily, root cause analysis is more of a reactive approach, which implies that a slip-up or problem event has already occurred before it is conducted. Your manufacturing organization’s root cause analysis, problem-solving, and incident investigation are all understood through the answers to a few straightforward questions, which are as follows:

• What exactly was the issue?
• Why did it happen?
• What measures may be taken to make sure that it doesn’t occur again?

The Origins and Development of Root Cause Analysis

The concepts of total quality management (TQM) and continuous improvement are intertwined with the practice of root cause analysis. TQM has developed in a number of various directions, a number of which include the analysis of problems, the answer to problems, and therefore the investigation of the basic causes of problems.

Analysis of the underlying causes is a necessary component of continuous improvement. Root cause Analysis causes won’t produce any results if it’s done by itself; rather, it has to be integrated into a bigger culture of problem-solving so as to contribute to quality improvement.

Purposes of Conducting a Root Cause Analysis

• The primary objective of a root cause analysis is to pinpoint the underlying factor or factors that are answerable for a controversy.
• The second objective is to achieve an understanding of how the underlying problem within the foundation cause is fixed or learned from.
  
• After you’ve got found the source of the matter, removed it, or brought it in restraint, the subsequent step is to place in situ the procedures and/or systems that may prevent it from happening again.
  

In addition to determining which procedures or systems contributed to the occurrence of the matter, it’s essential to concentrate on the third goal.

Tools and Methods for Conducting Root Cause Analysis

The methodology of root cause analysis is implemented utilizing a large range of tools and approaches. The subsequent are the methods that are most often and extensively used.

5 Whys

Sakichi Toyoda, the founding father of the Toyota Production System, is credited with developing the 5 Whys technique, which later became a vital component of the Lean philosophy. The technique may be a part of the Toyota Production System. “The fundamental tenet of Toyota’s scientific approach is to research a controversy by posing the question “why” five times… If you ask yourself “why” five times, you will be able to understand not only the character of the matter but also the way to solve it.

When employing this method, you may want to confirm that you simply follow up each answer to a “why” question with a further “Ok, but why?” question after each time you are doing so. there’s no limit to the quantity of “why” questions that will be asked; however, it’s common practice to ask “why” questions five times, which can lead you to the underlying explanation for the matter.

The following is an illustration of a way to apply the 5 Whys. Maybe one amongst the machines on your mechanical system isn’t adhering the label to the bottle properly. This can not only have a negative impact on the standard of your product, but it’s also leading to a big amount of waste. The statement “The label includes a wrinkle within the middle of the bottle” might be used because of the problem statement.

First:  why is the label not being properly applied to the bottle? Why is this happening?

Answer: The initial response is that it’s probably because there’s something wrong with the machine.

Second: why the machine is functioning improperly?

Answer: Because a component or a part of the labeling arm isn’t securely fastened.

Third: Why is the component lost?

Answer: The component wasn’t inspected thoroughly enough.

Fourth: Why wasn’t a correct inspection done on it?

Answer: Because the road operator didn’t perform each step of the clean, inspect, and lubricate (CIL) process correctly.

Fifth: Why did the road operator not perform all of the CIL steps in the correct manner?

Answer: Because they’re counting on their own recollection of the CIL steps.

An essential point to recollect when using the 5 whys technique is that despite the actual fact that doing so can be appealing, you should not rush to seek out an answer. The answer will become apparent once the underlying problem has been identified (s).

That wraps up this discussion. After answering the five questions, you’ll have an understanding of the elemental reason behind the inaccurate application of the label. If you discover the answers to every successive question, you may eventually make the final word “why,” which can lead you to the failure, and from there you’ll take action to repair the difficulty.

Diagram of a Fishbone

Another tool that’s frequently utilized in root cause analysis is the fishbone diagram, which is additionally called the Ishikawa diagram or the cause-and-effect diagram. It’s accustomed to identifying potential causes of an issue that will have led to the effect that’s occurring at this point. During this scenario, the potential causes of the matter are organized into subcategories, and people subcategories are linked back to the first issue. This process is repeated until the right cause is identified.

You would begin with the difficulty at hand (the backbone of the fish skeleton), and from there, you’d generate a variety of various categories of causes that are offshoots of the first line of inquiry (the bones of the fish skeleton). People, environments, methods, materials, machines, and measurements are a number of the components that represent these categories. After choosing your categories, the subsequent step is to narrow your focus even further. For example, under the heading “machine,” you could possibly consider factors like a machine malfunction, employee error, or a defect within the machine itself as potential root causes.

The next thing to try and do is to research each branch (or bone) in greater depth so as to urge closer to the issue’s primary source of origin.

Pareto Chart

A chart called a Pareto chart may be wont to determine which factors are the foremost important. It’s supported by the Pareto Principle, also called the 80/20 rule, which states that 20 percent of the failure modes are to blame for 80 percent of the issues. The peak of every bar within the chart corresponds to the amount of a cause, and also the chart is organized from most vital impact to least significant impact (from left to right). This generates a transparent visualization of the knowledge, which enables you to work out where you ought to invest it slowly in brainstorming and actions to handle the problem. The graph that follows displays, using bars to represent the number of your time spent at each machine and a line to represent the overall amount of your time spent, if you solve for the bar with the best height, you’ll verify that statement, but doing so will only affect a tiny low portion of the problem.

The contribution of every one of the things or factors that are at the basis of an issue is often visualized with the assistance of a Pareto chart, which is often used during a brainstorming session. They need the potential to be useful, but they’re only applicable to particular types of data, specifically hypothetical data.

Scatter Plot Diagram

A scatter plot also called a scatter diagram, could be a sort of diagram which will be accustomed to determine whether or not two different sets of information are associated with each other. It’s a quantitative method for determining whether or not two variables are correlated, and it works in the same way as testing potential causes identified in your fishbone diagram.

In order to get a scatter diagram, you want to first plot the variable (also referred to as the possible cause) along the x-axis and therefore the variable quantity (also called the effect) along the y-axis. You’ll easily be able to determine whether or not the variables are correlated if the pattern displays a line or curve. You’ll be able to then proceed with either regression or correlation analysis.

Analysis of the Causes, Modes, and Effects of Failure (FMEA)

Analysis of failure modes and their effects, abbreviated as FMEA, could be a technique that will be utilized to work out all of the possible flaws that will be present in an exceeding product’s design, manufacturing process, assembly process, or assembly process. Failure modes analysis and effects analysis are the 2 primary components that are included.

Failure modes encompass a range of potential ways, or modes, within which something could malfunction. Any errors or defects, particularly ones that have control over the customer, are considered to be failures. Effects analysis involves viewing the implications of these failures.

About Enteros

Enteros offers a patented database performance management SaaS platform. It proactively identifies root causes of complex business-impacting database scalability and performance issues across a growing number of RDBMS, NoSQL, and machine learning database platforms.