💡 Why This Tool Matters
FMEA is proactive risk management. Instead of waiting for failures to happen and reacting, you systematically ask: 'What COULD go wrong, how bad would it be, and would we even catch it?' The RPN score (Severity × Occurrence × Detection) mathematically prioritizes which risks to attack first. High Severity + Low Detection = your biggest blind spot. That's where you invest your energy.
⚡ Facilitator Pro Tip
Don't try to reduce all RPNs to zero — that's impossible. Focus on any RPN above 200 or any item with Severity ≥ 8 regardless of RPN. Also: Detection is often the easiest score to improve. Adding an inspection step or poka-yoke device can dramatically drop Detection score without changing the process itself.
1 FMEA Header
2 Failure Modes
For each failure mode: What could go wrong? How bad is it (Severity)? How often (Occurrence)? Would we catch it (Detection)?
S — Severity
1 = No effect → 10 = Safety hazard
O — Occurrence
1 = Almost impossible → 10 = Almost certain
D — Detection
1 = Will catch it → 10 = Won't detect it
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