# Why Five?

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This was originally posted on [thescri.be](http://thescri.be/2007/04/07/why-five/) on 7 April 2007 and was imported here from the [Internet Archive](https://web.archive.org/web/20101129092603/http://thescri.be/why-five-2007/) on 18 December 2025.
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Here's a good piece of advice from the National Health Service and unusually it isn't about Health.

[NHS The Improvement Network - Five Whys](http://www.tin.nhs.uk/tools-techniques/links-to-other-tt/hidden/five-whys)

They recommend asking why five times in order to drill down to the core of a problem. It does leave me wondering what happens if you need to ask more than five whys to get to the root, but I suppose you have to draw a line somewhere.

I think this ties in well with [my last post](/notes/2007-04-07-problems-solutions-worrying) as far as the way in which you should break down problems is concerned.

Many people see a problem and then produce a solution to it, without giving a thought to the underlying cause of that problem. By asking why a few times the problem, and others like it, can be solved for good.