Fishbone diagrams, also known as Ishikawa diagrams, are popular in modern business for assessing complex processes. They represent cause and effect, with smaller lines branching off a main horizontal line, and are useful for visually assessing conditions that may influence production results. They are just one of several types of cause-and-effect diagrams used by professionals in planning and problem-solving.
The fishbone diagram, also called the Ishikawa diagram, was created in Japan. History goes that fishbone diagrams were first used in Mazda sports car engineering. These types of diagrams have become popular in many parts of the modern business world, including manufacturing, where they can be useful for assessing what went wrong with a complex process.
Fishbone diagrams are composed of a main horizontal line, in which smaller lines branch off the main line diagonally. This makes the graph look like a fish skeleton. The “fish bones” represent cause and effect in a situation where a production problem or other dilemma needs to be resolved. The fishbone diagram provides a much faster perspective than a block of text, which is a major part of its appeal to busy executives.
Fishbone diagrams for product design, quality control, and other common uses often group different types of causal factors into the same fishbone or category of fish. This includes people or people involved in the process as well as the Method, or how the work was designed to be done. Other categories include Machinery, Equipment Used in the Process, Materials, Raw Materials Used, and Environment, an umbrella term for a variety of causal factors. Some types of fishbone diagrams use words with the same initial letter to promote easy categorization.
Fishbone diagrams can be called an “aggregate model” as they incorporate smaller causes, contributing to larger ones. This is represented by small diagonals attached to the various diagonals that connect directly to the main horizontal line. This type of model is useful in visually assessing various conditions or events that may have an influence on the production result.
Fishbone diagrams are just one of several types of cause-and-effect diagrams that planners can use to minimize problems in a task. The same types of professionals who use fishbone diagrams might use histograms, pareto charts, scatter plots, control charts, check sheets, or any number of other planning and problem-solving tools. In more complex systems involving money or other variables, advanced planning can utilize tools that measure or quantify a variable condition in more abstract ways. Computers have made possible more types of projections in decision-making for human planners, and in the modern world of planning, fishbone diagrams represent a more concrete or basic planning tool.
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