Soapbox-There are no root causes

摘要

This piece is not about a quality tool, a standard or the successful implementation of a system, but something far more important: a fundamental concept. Quality practitioners make frequent use of the concept of a "root cause" and for many it plays a significant role in their work. Associated with this concept is the dogma that to prevent the recurrence of a problem, it is necessary to determine its root cause. It is an unfortunate state of affairs because root causes do not exist and so the dogma is false.