Jira & Confluence 
Bitrix24 Stopping at "human error"
If the answer is a person, ask one more why: what made the mistake easy to make? The fix that lasts is usually in a procedure, a design or a check.
Incident at work · step 2 of 3
Root cause analysis template that turns causes into actions
Ask why until you reach a cause you can fix in a process, not a person. Check the other causes on a fishbone, rate the risk before and after, and give every action one owner and a due date.
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- 1State the problem as facts. One or two sentences from the incident report: what happened, where and when. No causes yet.
- 2Ask why five times. Each answer becomes the next question. Back every answer with evidence: a statement, a photo, a log entry.
- 3Check the fishbone. List other causes under People, Methods, Machines, Materials, Measurement and Environment. Mark which ones the evidence shows contributed.
- 4Score the risk and assign actions. Rate likelihood and severity before and after. Give each action one owner, a type, a due date and a status, then send the sheet to the owners.
The situation
When this template earns its place
The incident report says what happened. Now the team has to agree why it happened and what will stop it happening again. This live spreadsheet opens on the page without registration: the 5 Whys sheet checks that every why is answered, the fishbone counts contributing causes by category, the risk matrix scores each risk before and after the actions, and the action list shows what is overdue today.
How to use it
A short path to a usable result
1
State the problem as facts
One or two sentences from the incident report: what happened, where and when. No causes yet.
2
Ask why five times
Each answer becomes the next question. Back every answer with evidence: a statement, a photo, a log entry.
3
Check the fishbone
List other causes under People, Methods, Machines, Materials, Measurement and Environment. Mark which ones the evidence shows contributed.
4
Score the risk and assign actions
Rate likelihood and severity before and after. Give each action one owner, a type, a due date and a status, then send the sheet to the owners.
Filled example
See the result before you start
The filled example continues the warehouse near miss. Five whys lead from "the truck got too close" to a pre-use inspection procedure with no step for reporting defects. The fishbone lists 14 causes, 11 of them contributing. Two critical risks drop to medium and low after the actions. Of 9 actions, 5 are done and 2 are overdue as of 16 Nov 2026.
Common mistakes
What makes the document stop working
Actions without owners or dates
"Improve training" with no owner is a wish. The check line stays red until every action has an owner, a due date and a status.
Only corrective actions
Fixing the broken light is corrective. Changing the procedure so the next broken light is caught is preventive. You need both.
FAQ
Questions before you use it
Is it free? Do I need to sign up?
It is free and you do not need an account to use the spreadsheet on this page. Sign-in appears only when you save it to a workspace or invite a team.
5 Whys or fishbone — which should I use?
Both. The 5 Whys follows one chain of cause and effect deeply; the fishbone makes sure you have not missed causes in other categories.
Do I always need exactly five whys?
No. Five is a rule of thumb. Stop when you reach a cause you can act on in a process; keep going if the answer is still a person or "bad luck".
How is the risk level calculated?
Score = likelihood × severity, each from 1 to 5. Low is 1–4, Medium 5–9, High 10–15, Critical 16–25. You can change the thresholds in the formulas.
Can I use it as a post mortem template for IT outages?
Yes. Use the same sheets: the problem is the outage, the fishbone categories still apply, and the actions go to the owning engineers.
What happens when I send actions to owners?
Each owner gets a link to the workbook and opens it without an account. The Corrective actions sheet shows their rows, due dates and what is overdue as of the date you set.