Articles

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We might be doing a Shallow Cause Analysis (SCA) if … 1. We blame and discipline the violator and that concludes the investigation. There is no attempt to try and understand the intent of the decision.

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Note: Everyone has their own way to use cause-and-effect logic trees and we use the PROACT RCA Methodology that we teach in our root cause analysis training courses. Sign up for our free RCA 101 course. What is a Logic Tree? A logic tree, in a general sense, is a graphical representation or structure used to systematically organize and display

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There has been an ongoing debate for decades as to whether the use of pre-existing logic for conducting Root Cause Analyses (i.e. RCA templates and/or libraries) – helps or hinders the analysis results. Does the use of such pre-existing logic expand the thinking of the team members or does it lead the team to pre-determined conclusions, and away from other

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This article contrasts the application of preventive and predictive technologies in industry to those in healthcare. For years, risk managers have been discussing the rationing of care. This article presents the perspective of an engineering professional from the manufacturing industry who now consults with healthcare risk managers. The human being is often referred to as an “asset” in our society.

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Has your organization adopted Six Sigma? Lean manufacturing?  What about Lean Six Sigma?  If you already have any of these business process improvements in place, where will you go next? In this article we will focus on transforming your organization beyond Lean Six Sigma to the next level of performance. 

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  Can you identify and name this fracture pattern? How can you tell it is that fracture pattern? Where are the origin(s) of the failure on the fractured surface? How can you tell where the origin(s) are?

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This failure occurred on a turbine driven boiler feedwater pump (TDBFP) at a fossil fuel power plant. The pump in question is an outboard boiler feed pump. Plant is operating normally when unexpectedly pump shuts down and causes a forced outage. Here is a basic process flow diagram for this process…

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This is a failed shaft that came out of a pump in a paper mill. The pump was only in service for about a month before it failed unexpectedly…

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In our last series highlighting the 4 primary Failure Modes (FM) of component failures (erosion, corrosion, fatigue and overload), we discussed how to read fractured surfaces. In this follow-up series, we will take a look at tips on how to collect, preserve and examine such failed components. I will reiterate my intent to make this series, as with the others, as

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“Failure Mode and Effect Analysis” (FMEA) and “Root Cause Analysis” (RCA) are becoming commonplace terms in work environments and in the literature. This article will demonstrate that these terms, while seemingly generic references to regulatory compliance, actually elicit various interpretations from individuals. Therefore, applications of FMEAs and RCAs will be equally disjointed, along with the inconsistency of the analysis results.

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In this blog, I discuss the RCA definition I used as a career analyst/investigator and explain why it makes sense to me. You decide if it makes sense in your facility. RCA is so ill-defined that no matter what people use to solve problems at their facilities (i.e.- troubleshooting, brainstorming, problem-solving or scribbling on a bar napkin)…they will call it

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There are various ways for us to improve our root cause analysis and take our reliability to the next level. Reliability professionals could do RCAs on a napkin, using kraft paper and post it notes, or utilizing fancy software. In the end, the analysis is only as good as the analyst! I have seen some pretty bad ‘RCA’s documented in