What Would You Do If You Saw a Bad 5-Why Example?

It seems that I’m continually confronted by folks that think 5-Whys is an acceptable root cause analysis tool. 

The reason they bring up the subject to me is that I have frequently published articles pointing out the drawbacks of 5-Whys. Here are some examples…

Article in Quality Progress: Under Scrutiny (page 32)

An Example of 5 Whys – Is this Root Cause Analysis? Let Me Know Your Thoughts…

What’s Fundamentally Wrong with 5-Whys?

Teruyuki Minoura (Toyota Exec) Talks About Problems with 5-Whys

That got me thinking … Have I EVER seen a good example of a 5-Why root cause analysis that I thought was a good example of a root cause analysis? And the answer was “NO.”

So here is my question … 

What do you do when you see someone presenting a bad root cause analysis where they are missing the point?

Leave a comment below and let me know the tack that you take … What do you think?