TOP-SET evidence board
Gather the evidence for an incident investigation across the six TOP-SET headings — Technology, Organisation, People, Similar Events, Environment, Time — recording each source and whether it is confirmed, still to verify, or a known gap. The coverage panel shows which headings you have nothing on. Export CSV, JSON or a printable report.
Open TOP-SET evidence board →What is a TOP-SET evidence board?
A free incident-investigation evidence board that runs entirely in your browser. TOP-SET is a widely used way of organising investigation evidence under six headings — Technology, Organisation, People, Similar Events, Environment and Time — so that a team gathering facts on site has a structure to hang them on rather than a blank page. This tool gives each heading a column: you record what the evidence is, where it came from, what kind of evidence it is, and whether it is confirmed, still to verify, or a known gap. The coverage panel above the board then counts what you have against each heading. That count is the point of the tool. A heading with nothing under it is not an empty column, it is a blind spot in the investigation — and a blind spot is almost invisible in a narrative report. Every heading is editable, so a team that uses different categories can reshape the board to its own method. This is an independent tool: it is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or a product of Kelvin TOP-SET Ltd.
How to use TOP-SET evidence board
- Record the incident and who is leading — Name the incident, give it your reference number, set the date and the investigation lead. These carry into the printed report and the exported filename, so the board is traceable back to the event.
- Work each heading in turn — Take the six columns one at a time rather than jumping around. Each carries a prompt for what belongs there — plant and instrumentation under Technology, procedures and supervision under Organisation, and so on.
- Write down where each fact came from — The source field matters as much as the evidence. "Gusting crosswind, 18 kt" from an interview is a different quality of fact from the same figure off a data logger, and only the source tells you which you have.
- Mark the status honestly — Confirmed, to verify, or gap. Recording a gap is not an admission of failure — a known missing piece is a finding, and it belongs in the report so somebody chases it.
- Read the coverage panel before you leave site — The bars show how much you hold against each heading and the split between confirmed, to verify and gap. Any heading marked as having nothing is called out underneath. That is your list of what to go and get while you still can.
- Reshape the headings if your method differs — Rename any column, remove one that does not apply, or add your own. The six are a starting point, not a fixed taxonomy.
- Export the board — Print a report for the investigation file, export CSV to work the evidence in a spreadsheet, or save JSON to carry the board to another device or hand it to a colleague.
Frequently asked questions
What do the six headings stand for?
Technology, Organisation, People, Similar Events, Environment and Time. They are deliberately broad, and the value is in their spread rather than in precise boundaries — between them they cover the plant, the management system, the humans, the history, the conditions and the sequence.
Is this Kelvin TOP-SET's software?
No. This is an independent, free tool that organises evidence under the publicly documented TOP-SET headings. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or a product of Kelvin TOP-SET Ltd, and it is not their investigation software. If your organisation is trained in their method and needs their licensed product, go to them.
Does it matter which heading a fact goes under?
Less than you would think. A fact recorded under a slightly odd heading is still recorded; a fact nobody thought to look for is lost. Use the headings as prompts for what to go and find, and do not spend the investigation arguing about where something belongs.
Why record gaps rather than leaving them out?
Because an investigation that quietly omits what it could not obtain reads as more complete than it is. A logged gap tells a reviewer what was tried, what is outstanding, and how much weight the conclusions can bear.
Can I change the headings?
Yes — rename, remove or add any of them. Teams using ICAM, a company-specific framework, or their own house method can set the board up to match, and it will be saved that way on your device.
Where does the evidence go afterwards?
Into the causal analysis. Once the facts are gathered, a Tripod Beta tree, an ICAM cause analysis, a bow-tie or a 5 Whys chain turns them into causes and recommendations. This board is the step before that, not a replacement for it.
Does anything leave my device?
No. The board is built and saved in your browser's local storage. There is no account, no upload and no server, and it works offline — which matters when the evidence is confidential.
Tips
- Fill the source field every time. Six months later, an unattributed fact in an investigation file is worth very little, and you will not remember who told you.
- Look at the coverage panel while you are still on site. Its whole purpose is to catch a missing heading at the point when it is still cheap to go and gather it.
- Similar Events is the heading teams skip most often, and it is frequently where the strongest finding lives — a near-miss card or an unclosed action from last year that predicted this exact event.
- Keep one item to one fact. Bundling three observations into a single entry makes the counts meaningless and hides which part is confirmed and which is not.
- Export JSON before handing the investigation to someone else — it round-trips the whole board, including your edited headings.