Also known as a fish-bone or Ishikawa diagram, named after its inventor Kauro Ishikawa, a cause and effect diagram provides a graphical representation of contributing causes.
The causes are categorized into broad categories. Some of these categories in a manufacturing setup may include people, material, Mother Nature or environment, method, machinery, measurement, and so on. These categories can be customized according to the needs of the process. These causes can be obtained through brainstorming sessions. Brainstorming refers to a group of people discussing a topic and suggesting various ideas around the topic. We will discuss brainstorming in detail in the improve stage. The effect forms the "head" of the fish.
A typical cause and effect diagram looks like this:
These are the steps to draw an effective cause and effect diagram:
Identify the problem or the effect: Write the effect or the problem at the extreme right-hand side of the paper in a triangle and...