Iceberg Analysis Diagram
An iceberg diagram — visible symptoms above the waterline, the causes that produce them below — where every symptom is traced to a named cause instead of the two halves being separate lists. Six fields.
We made two examples: a library nobody returns to, and for Harbour Row a quay whose boats miss the tide. Each has three symptoms and four causes, every cause tagged and every symptom explained. Both go further than asked and draw lines from each cause up through the ice to the symptom it produces.
Above the waterline you get three numbered symptoms, below it four causes, each tagged with the numbers of what it produces, and every number appears at least once in the water. The submerged mass is about four times the peak and the sheet fills the frame. Often it also draws connector lines from cause to symptom, which makes the argument even clearer. If the image comes back as a portrait sheet inset in a landscape canvas with blurred sides, generate again.
Generated for this library
Input
Subject WHY PEOPLE STOP USING THE LIBRARY - what you can
measure is not what is deciding it
Symptoms people open it once · nobody links to it · the
same question keeps being asked
Causes no worked example on any page (1, 3) · search only
matches titles (2) · every entry written by a
different hand (1, 3) · nothing says when it was
last true (2)
Closing Fix the pages and it looks better for a month. Fix
who writes them and it stops recurring.
Ratio underwater mass roughly four times the peak
Palette deep blue below, pale sky above, one warm accent
Returned 1 diagram · 16:9 · full bleed, waterline across
above three symptoms numbered 1 2 3, on leaders to the
visible peak, pale sky behind
below four causes, each carrying the numbers of the
symptoms it produces, in the dark water
mass the submerged body filling most of the frame, the
peak a small fraction of it
close one line at the lower right, treating the top
against treating the bottom
check every number 1 2 3 appears at least once belowYou fill in 6 fields — the braced lines at the top. Everything below them is fixed.
- 1The subject, and the line under it
- 2The three visible symptoms
- 3The causes below, each tagged to the symptoms it produces
- 4The closing line
- 5The proportion
- 6The palette
Iceberg Analysis Diagram
What this makes
An iceberg diagram — visible symptoms above the waterline, the causes that produce them below — where every symptom is traced to a named cause instead of the two halves being separate lists. Six fields.
The whole template, in one piece. The steps below are the entire workflow.
How to use it
- Copy the whole template with the button above.
- Replace the six FIELDS lines. In the third, tag each cause with the numbers of the symptoms it produces — that tagging is the diagram's argument and doing it in the fields is what stops the halves drifting apart.
- Paste it into any image-capable agent or model, in one message. One run returns the diagram.
- Check the linkage before shipping: every symptom above should carry at least one cause below. A symptom nobody explained is a hole in the argument.
What you swap
- The subject, and the line under it
- WHY PEOPLE STOP USING THE LIBRARY — what you can measure is not what is deciding it
- The three visible symptoms
- people open it once · nobody links to it · the same question keeps being asked
- The causes below, each tagged to the symptoms it produces
- no worked example on any page (1, 3) · the search only matches titles (2) · every entry was written by a different hand (1, 3) · nothing says when it was last true (2)
- The closing line
- Fix the pages and it looks better for a month. Fix who writes them and it stops recurring.
- The proportion
- the underwater mass roughly four times the visible peak
- The palette
- deep blue below, pale sky above, one warm accent on the numbers
Before it runs
- Causes you can actually attach to symptoms. If a deep item explains nothing above it, it is background, not a cause.
- Symptoms somebody has actually noticed. The top of the iceberg is what makes the diagram recognisable; invented symptoms make the whole argument hypothetical.
- Willingness to be wrong in public. This diagram makes a causal claim, and a claim is the point of it.
When to reach for it
When the obvious problem is not the real one: churn, delays, complaints, a metric nobody can move. Templates in this style put the visible things on top and the deep things underneath and never connect them, which asserts hidden causation without showing any.
What changes
- One iceberg diagram: symptoms above the water, causes below, the underwater mass several times the visible one.
- Every symptom traced by number to at least one cause, so the diagram argues rather than merely arranges.
- The proportion treated as the claim it is — the ratio above to below is the whole point of choosing this shape.
- A closing line that states what follows: treating the top is relief, treating the bottom is a fix.
- Full bleed, since this layout is habitually rendered as a portrait poster floating in a wider frame.
Pairs with
- Concentric Capability ModelA concentric capability model — one subject, three rings, four sectors — where depth means prerequisite rather than decoration. Six fields.
- Converging Causes DiagramA convergence diagram — several causes funnelling into one hub and out to its effects — governed by the rule that keeps such a diagram true rather than merely tidy. Six fields.
- Exploded Axonometric DiagramAn exploded axonometric that pulls one site apart into stacked transparent layers — kept on white and kept analytical, because the temptation is to render it dramatic and lose the drawing. Six fields.