What is your first thought when you hear Fishbone??

Yeah, it’s the bone of a fish that we discard after eating the meat

Naah, the fishbone I am talking about is extremely important when it comes to Quality!!

I know the word QUALITY might have reminded you about…….

You caught it right...one of the seven Quality tools!!

Yes, it is the fishbone diagram, Ishikawa diagram or cause effect diagram, which resembles the skeleton of a fish, is a tool used to identify the root cause of problems which represents the effect and the factors or causes influencing it. As there could be infinite causes, this helps in identifying the root causes in a structured and precise way.

The Ishikawa or fishbone diagram is used when a team seeks to understand the many potential causes contributing to the quality of care problem and focus improvement efforts on these causes

What does each bone and spine represent?

What does the fish's head represent?

A central line or spine is next drawn to the left of the box or head in which the problem is recorded. The bones or diagonal lines are then drawn coming off the central line. These diagonal lines represent different groupings of causes of the problem which mainly comes under 6M’s (machine, method, materials, measurement, man, and Mother Nature). Additional lines can also be drawn off the main fish bones to represent the sub-causes.

Now you gotta try!