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022-root-cause-analysis

Use when a framed problem needs root-cause investigation rather than a symptom-level fix, applying Five Whys, Fishbone (Ishikawa), Current Reality Tree, and constraint identification. This should trigger when an issue's Root Cause Analysis point of view needs evaluation, or when a maintainer directly asks to find the root cause of a problem before proposing a fix. Part of Plinth Toolkit

75

Quality

92%

Does it follow best practices?

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SecuritybySnyk

Passed

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SKILL.md
Quality
Evals
Security

Quality

Content

85%

Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.

A well-structured, actionable instruction skill with a clear sequenced workflow and clean one-level progressive disclosure to a verified reference file. The main weakness is redundancy: the four techniques are enumerated in three separate sections, which could be consolidated to improve token efficiency.

Suggestions

Consolidate the technique listing: 'What is covered in this Skill?', 'When to use this skill', and 'Workflow' each restate Five Whys, Fishbone, Current Reality Tree, and constraint identification — fold the coverage bullets into the corresponding workflow steps to remove the triple repetition.

Drop the opening paragraph that restates the frontmatter description verbatim and let the 'What is covered' or 'Workflow' section open the body directly.

Trim the duplicate 'Reference' section (the link already appears in the Workflow step 1 and the Constraints MUST), keeping a single clearly signaled pointer to references/022-root-cause-analysis.md.

DimensionReasoningScore

Conciseness

The body is lean and assumes Claude's competence (no basic definitions of the techniques), but the four techniques are restated across 'What is covered in this Skill?', 'When to use this skill', and 'Workflow', creating avoidable redundancy; not level 3 because that repetition could be tightened, and not level 1 because it is not padded with concepts Claude already knows.

2 / 3

Actionability

Gives concrete per-technique instruction — e.g. 'Chain "why" questions from the symptom toward an evidenced root cause, stopping when further "why" steps would require guessing' and 'Organize candidate causes into categories (people, process, technology, environment)'; for an instruction-only skill this is specific and actionable, so the absence of code is not penalized.

3 / 3

Workflow Clarity

A clear six-step sequence (read reference → Five Whys → Fishbone → Current Reality Tree → identify constraint → report) with an explicit error-handling checkpoint ('flag any finding left open pending a clarifying answer'); the cap-at-2 rule for missing validation does not apply because this is non-destructive analysis rather than a batch or destructive operation.

3 / 3

Progressive Disclosure

SKILL.md is a concise overview that points to a single one-level-deep reference ('references/022-root-cause-analysis.md'), which exists on disk and is clearly signaled both as a MUST-read constraint and in a dedicated Reference section; not level 2 because navigation is explicit and the split is appropriate.

3 / 3

Total

11

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12

Passed

Description

100%

Based on the skill's description, can an agent find and select it at the right time? Clear, specific descriptions lead to better discovery.

A strong description that pairs concrete, named techniques with explicit 'Use when'/'This should trigger when' guidance, clearly distinguishing root-cause analysis from symptom-level fixes. Minor verbosity in the second trigger clause and the trailing 'Part of Plinth Toolkit' tag do not materially weaken it.

DimensionReasoningScore

Specificity

Names multiple concrete techniques — 'Five Whys, Fishbone (Ishikawa), Current Reality Tree, and constraint identification' — matching the anchor for listing several specific capabilities; not the level below because it goes beyond naming only a domain.

3 / 3

Completeness

Explicitly answers both what ('root-cause investigation... applying Five Whys, Fishbone...') and when ('Use when a framed problem needs root-cause investigation', 'This should trigger when...'); not level 2 because the 'when' is explicit, not merely implied.

3 / 3

Trigger Term Quality

Includes natural phrasing a user or maintainer would actually say — 'find the root cause of a problem' and 'Root Cause Analysis' — giving good coverage of common variations; the jargony 'point of view needs evaluation' clause is offset by these natural triggers.

3 / 3

Distinctiveness Conflict Risk

Carves a clear niche (root-cause vs symptom-level fix) anchored by named analysis techniques, making it unlikely to trigger for the wrong skill; not level 2 because the trigger is specific rather than broadly overlapping.

3 / 3

Total

12

/

12

Passed

Validation

100%

Checks the skill against the spec for correct structure and formatting. All validation checks must pass before discovery and implementation can be scored.

Validation16 / 16 Passed

Validation for skill structure

No warnings or errors.

Repository
jabrena/plinth
Reviewed

Table of Contents

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