In a profitability case structuring, after doing initial diagnosis, I will usually go to the second step “root cause analysis” (i.e. discuss what has driven the change identified in the initial analysis).

At times I struggle on the root cause analysis, since (1) Before going into the case discussion, not much information is disclosed. I don't know whether price / revenue / cost / quantity have changed. (2) Without know the specific change factors, it is hard to structure a tailed root cause analysis issue tree.

Should I just mention a general structure (such as, I will look into product / competitor / company / customer related factors, and will come up with a tailored issue tree after knowing more facts and data), or should I come up with a comprehensive structure mapping at most possible root causes driving the profit decline?

Please share your thoughts, thank you!