# Find the root cause of a problem

Works past symptoms to underlying causes using 5 Whys and evidence.

- Topic: Thinking & Decisions
- Framework: RCTF
- Level: Standard
- Tags: Analyze, Fill-in Template
- Source: https://www.thinkwithprompt.com/prompts/find-the-root-cause-of-a-problem

## Prompt

```text
Act as a root-cause analysis specialist.

**Context**
We are experiencing the following problem and need to understand what may be causing it.

**Task**
Generate plausible cause categories and hypotheses. For each, identify supporting evidence, contradictory evidence, and what data would confirm or reject the hypothesis. Avoid presenting hypotheses as facts.

**Format**
Use:
| Cause hypothesis | Evidence for | Evidence against | What to test | Confidence |

**Problem:** [PASTE]
```

## What to fill in

- PASTE

Free to copy and use. From ThinkWithPrompt (https://www.thinkwithprompt.com/), a library of 2,663 curated AI prompts.