Affinity Diagram

 ‘Voice of Customer’ may throw up too many Customer Needs

 Organizing these needs to make sense & enable decisions is hard
 Similar situation occurs in Brainstorming of ideas in problem solving
 Affinity diagram helps us organize such huge information
 Also called KJ (Kawakita Jiro ) method after Japanese anthropologist
 The tool helps to organize the huge no. of needs/ideas by finding
relationships among them
 The information is then gradually structured from the bottom up
into meaningful groups
 We can then clearly "see" what we have, & analyse/decide
 Random Information Affinity Diagram
Theme 1 Theme 2 Theme 3

Affinity diagrams can be used to:

 Draw out common themes from a large number of ideas or huge data
 Discover previously unseen connections between various ideas or data
 Brainstorm root causes and solutions to a problem
 Significance of Affinity Diagrams
 Many decision-making exercises begin with brainstorming
 Hence, most common use of affinity diagrams is after a brainstorming session
 After brainstorming there are usually pages of ideas. These are not censored
or edited in any way. Many of them will be very similar or closely related to
others
 An affinity diagram starts to group the ideas into themes
 From the chaos of randomly generated ideas comes an insight into the
common threads that link groups of them together
 From there the solution or best idea often emerges quite naturally
 Affinity diagram is hence powerful and the Japanese Union of Scientists and
Engineers considers it one of the "seven management tools."
 Applications of Affinity Diagrams
 Application of Affinity Diagrams is not limited to the field of
brainstorming
They can be used in any situation where:
 The solution is not readily apparent
 You want to reach a consensus or decision and have a lot of variables
to consider, concepts to discuss, ideas to connect, or opinions to
incorporate
 There is a large volume of information to sort through
A step-by-step guide to using affinity diagrams along with a simple
example to show how the process works is presented next
 How to Use Affinity Diagram Tool?

1. Describe the problem or issue. For example,

Customer service is sub-standard
2. Generate ideas by brainstorming.
Write each idea on a separate sticky note and put these on a
wall or flip chart.
Remember to:
a) Emphasize volume
b) Suspend judgment
c} Piggyback on other ideas
 Why is customer service sub-standard?

Too much Untrained staff

turnover No standard
systems
There aren’t Staff aren’t
enough phone compensated
lines enough
There is no measurement
Staff morale for what is & what is not
is low good service

Staff feel
un-appreciated Not enough
management
support
 How to Use Affinity Diagram Tool?

3. Sort ideas into natural themes by asking:

a} What ideas are similar?
b) Is this idea connected to any of the others?
If you're working in a team:
a) Separate into smaller groups of 3 to 4 people
b) Sort the ideas IN SILENCE so that no one is influenced by
anyone else's comments
c) Keep moving the cards around until consensus is reached
 Why is customer service sub-standard?
No standard
Too much systems Not enough
turnover management
There is no measure- support
ment for what is &
Untrained staff what is not good Staff feel
service un-appreciated
Staff are not
compensated Staff morale
enough is low

There are not

enough phone
lines
 How to Use Affinity Diagram Tool?

4. Create total group consensus

a) Discuss the shared meaning of each of the sorted groups
b) Continue until consensus is reached
c) If some ideas do not fit into any theme, separate them as
"stand- alone" ideas
d) If some ideas fit into more than one theme, create a duplicate card
and put it in the proper group
e) Try to limit the total number of themes to between five and nine
 How to Use Affinity Diagram Tool?

5. Create theme cards (also called affinity cards or header cards)

a) Create a short 3-5 word description for the relationship
b) If you're working in a group, do this together, out loud
c) Write this theme/header on a blank card and place at the top
of the group it describes
d) Create a "super-header" where necessary to group themes
e) Use a "sub-header" card where necessary as well
 Why is customer service sub-standard?
Lack of standard
Human Resource Workplace Resources
Processes &
Issues Culture and Tools
Measurement

Too much No standard Not enough There are not

turnover systems management enough phone
support lines

There is no Staff feel

Untrained staff measurement for un-appreciated
what is & what is
not good service
Staff are not Staff morale
compensated is low
enough
 How to Use Affinity Diagram Tool?
6. Continue to group themes/headers until you reach the broadest, but still
meaningful, categories possible
a) Draw lines connecting the super-headers, themes/headers, and sub-headers
b) Resulting hierarchical structure shows up where the relationships are
 Grouping ideas under headings & super-headers is a practical way of
"chunking" info. generated in brainstorming sessions, through VOC input etc.
 Affinity diagrams are great tools for understanding and discovering hidden
linkages in huge & overwhelming info.
 When you work through process of creating relationships & work backward
from detailed info. to broad themes, you get insight you would miss otherwise
 When you cannot see the forest for the trees, an affinity diagram is exactly
what you need to get back in focus