Horvath (2021) suggests that Approaching problems with 5 whys comes with a few problems, mostly:
- too broad and might be misused (also Japanese has several types of why, so might be a limitation from the translation)
- "why" has a bunch of cultural implications, many of them negative
He suggests instead that we follow the iceberg model:
- Gather events (above the waterline; the rest is below)
- Observe if the events fit into a trend/pattern
- Try to identify what makes those trends emerge (systemic structures)
- Check which mental models brought us to those trends (assumptions, beliefs, values, etc)