Fix the Root Cause Instead of Just Picking a Villain

[marcus]

From https://finance.yahoo.com/economy/policy/articles/billionaire-jeff-bezos-says-america-152724456.html
Title : Billionaire Jeff Bezos Says America Needs to ‘Fix It at the Root’ Like Amazon Does Instead of Picking Villains ...
By Jeannine Mancini , June 2026

... “They’re using this age-old technique of picking a villain and pointing fingers,” Bezos said. “But the problem is that doesn’t solve anything.”...

“If we have a problem at Amazon, the way we would fix it is we’d go in and we’d do the five whys and we’d try to get to a root cause ... and then we fix it at the root,” Bezos said. “You’re fixing it forever. It’s a real solution.” ...

Bezos contrasted that with the finger-pointing he sees in politics ...

 

[Balifrog]

The difference is that in politics nobody wants to fix the roots.....
It would be like killling themselves, whereas they are there for glory and money....

 

[marcus]

... Bezos Says America Needs to ‘Fix It at the Root’ ...

It is an old idea that many of the world's politicians seem to miss .

 

[marcus]

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root-cause_analysis

In science and reliability engineering, root-cause analysis (RCA) is a method of problem solving used for identifying the root causes of faults or problems.[1] It is widely used in IT operations, manufacturing, telecommunications, industrial process control, accident analysis (e.g., in aviation,[2] rail transport, or nuclear plants), medical diagnosis, the healthcare industry (e.g., for epidemiology). Root-cause analysis is a form of inductive inference (first create a theory, or root, based on empirical evidence, or causes) and deductive inference (test the theory, i.e., the underlying causal mechanisms, with empirical data).

RCA can be decomposed into four steps:

1. Identify and describe the problem clearly
2. Establish a timeline from the normal situation until the problem occurrence
3. Distinguish between the root-cause and other causal factors (e.g., via event correlation)
4. Establish a causal graph between the root-cause and the problem ...

The name of this process varies between application domains. According to ISO/IEC 31010, RCA may include these techniques: 5 whys, failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), fault tree analysis, Ishikawa diagrams, and Pareto analysis ...

 

[Balifrog]

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root-cause_analysis

In science and reliability engineering, root-cause analysis (RCA) is a method of problem solving used for identifying the root causes of faults or problems.[1] It is widely used in IT operations, manufacturing, telecommunications, industrial process control, accident analysis (e.g., in aviation,[2] rail transport, or nuclear plants), medical diagnosis, the healthcare industry (e.g., for epidemiology). Root-cause analysis is a form of inductive inference (first create a theory, or root, based on empirical evidence, or causes) and deductive inference (test the theory, i.e., the underlying causal mechanisms, with empirical data).

RCA can be decomposed into four steps:

1. Identify and describe the problem clearly
2. Establish a timeline from the normal situation until the problem occurrence
3. Distinguish between the root-cause and other causal factors (e.g., via event correlation)
4. Establish a causal graph between the root-cause and the problem ...

The name of this process varies between application domains. According to ISO/IEC 31010, RCA may include these techniques: 5 whys, failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), fault tree analysis, Ishikawa diagrams, and Pareto analysis ...

Complicated way to describe problem solving....
But hey, the more complicated, the more ISO processes, EU regulations, the more pen pushers or "safety engineers" justify their job....

Been involved in equipment breakdown analysis, crane accident analysis...
Nowadays it is just about "was the right form filled properly".

A basic accident of somebody falling of a ladder, first question "was that ladder properly registerted on the site ladder register, and when was it last inspected ?"

The rest is secondary.....

"A construction ladder register tracks your inventory, verifies compliance, and logs required safety inspections. It is usually split into two parts: an Inventory Log and a Periodic Inspection Tracker."

And the "safety inspector" is usually 24 years old..

Aviation being maybe the exception.

Ok, rant over.

 

[harryopal1]

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Corporate Jargon generator

aneeshmg.github.io

 

[Bob]

Complicated way to describe problem solving....
But hey, the more complicated, the more ISO processes, EU regulations, the more pen pushers or "safety engineers" justify their job....

Been involved in equipment breakdown analysis, crane accident analysis...
Nowadays it is just about "was the right form filled properly".

A basic accident of somebody falling of a ladder, first question "was that ladder properly registerted on the site ladder register, and when was it last inspected ?"

The rest is secondary.....

"A construction ladder register tracks your inventory, verifies compliance, and logs required safety inspections. It is usually split into two parts: an Inventory Log and a Periodic Inspection Tracker."

And the "safety inspector" is usually 24 years old..

Aviation being maybe the exception.

Ok, rant over.

Aviation yes an exception. Shipping, oil and gas, deep mining and others too.

 

[Balifrog]

Aviation yes an exception. Shipping, oil and gas, deep mining and others too.

Shipping and deep mining depends on the country......

 

[pantaiema]

'Fix It at the Root’; 'a method of problem solving used for identifying the root causes of faults or problems.' It seems to me is easier said than done when it is applied to Indonesia.

In Indonesia, the root cause of many problems has long been recognised as KKN (Corruption, Collusion, and Nepotism). This jargon has been part of the national discourse since the New Order era under Suharto. Yet despite decades of awareness and reform efforts, has it ever been eliminated, or even significantly reduced?

In my view, the only major measure that has not been seriously tried in Indonesia is imposing the death penalty for severe corruption cases, combined with the full confiscation of illegally acquired assets. This measure might be implemented for short term measure as a shock therapy while prancing a long term solution such as via sub cultural change, education, etc.