
43
4
Failure Classification
Before discussing the issue of Root Cause Analysis we must rst begin setting the
foundation with some key terminology. As mentioned earlier in this text, one of
the primary reasons for the misinterpretation of “RCA” is that there is no standard
denition against which to benchmark it. Therefore, everyone denes RCA as
they please and the result is shallow cause methodologies being equated to root
cause methodologies.
For our purposes, let’s begin by discussing the key differences between the terms
“problems” and “opportunities.” There are many people who tend to use these terms
interchangeably. However, the ...