--- name: first-pass-yield-tracker description: "Stage-by-stage conversion through a process — how many units entered each stage, how many advanced without rework or rejection, and the rolled yield across every stage combined. Use when: You can count units entering and leaving each stage of a multi-step process — a production line, an approval workflow, an intake pipeline. You want to know not just the overall pass rate, but specifically which stage is losing the most. You want a rolled yield figure that reflects compounding loss across every stage, not an average of each stage's rate. Not for: You only have a single before-and-after count with no stage-level breakdown — that gives you an overall yield but not the 'which stage' finding this tool exists for. The process only has one step — there's no rolling to do, and a simple pass-rate figure will do the job without this tool. You want time-based analysis (lead time, flow efficiency, where WIP is piling up) rather than count-based conversion — that's value stream mapping." --- # First-pass yield tracker Stage-by-stage conversion through a process — how many units entered each stage, how many advanced without rework or rejection, and the rolled yield across every stage combined. Family: Quality at source · Format: .xlsx · Domain: core ## What it is First-pass yield is the share of units that make it through a process stage without rework, rejection, or scrap — and rolled yield is the same idea across every stage combined, which is always lower than any single stage's rate because losses compound. A first-pass yield tracker asks for one thing per stage: how many units entered, how many advanced. Everything else — the per-stage conversion rate, the rolled yield, and which stage is weakest — is computed from that. ## When to use it Use it when: - You can count units entering and leaving each stage of a multi-step process — a production line, an approval workflow, an intake pipeline. - You want to know not just the overall pass rate, but specifically which stage is losing the most. - You want a rolled yield figure that reflects compounding loss across every stage, not an average of each stage's rate. Not when: - You only have a single before-and-after count with no stage-level breakdown — that gives you an overall yield but not the 'which stage' finding this tool exists for. - The process only has one step — there's no rolling to do, and a simple pass-rate figure will do the job without this tool. - You want time-based analysis (lead time, flow efficiency, where WIP is piling up) rather than count-based conversion — that's value stream mapping. ## How to fill it in - **scope** — What's in and out of this process — which product line, which start and end point? A first-pass yield tracker with no stated boundary blends processes that don't belong together into a number that describes neither. - **stages** — List each stage in order with how many units entered it and how many advanced without rework or rejection. Pull real counts from a defect log or system of record where possible — a guessed count defeats the point of measuring at all. - **rolledYield** — Computed for you: the per-stage conversion rate for each stage, the rolled yield across all of them, and which single stage is weakest — nothing to enter here. - **narrative** — Drafted from the weakest-stage finding and your observation notes — what you've seen or heard about why that stage specifically is losing units. - **countermeasures** — What will you do about the weakest stage, ranked by impact and effort, owned and dated? A countermeasure that doesn't trace to the weakest-stage finding is a coaching failure mode, not a real action. ## What good looks like The example below is a four-stage assembly line's first-pass yield: real entered/advanced counts per stage, a rolled yield figure with the arithmetic shown, the weakest stage named with its loss count, and a countermeasure that traces directly to that finding rather than a generic quality push. Full worked example, on-screen and as a downloadable .xlsx: https://www.katafacts.com/katas/first-pass-yield-tracker ## Common mistakes - **Averaging each stage's conversion rate instead of computing the rolled (compounding) yield.** — Losses compound multiplicatively, not additively — four stages each at 95% conversion roll to about 81%, not 95%. Averaging overstates the real end-to-end yield every time there's more than one stage. - **Treating every stage below 100% as equally worth fixing.** — Same vital-few discipline as every other artifact in this catalogue — one weakest stage named with conviction beats a list of every stage with some loss. - **Counting units at the start and end of the process only, skipping intermediate stages.** — That gives an overall pass rate but destroys the one thing this tool is for: naming which specific stage is where the loss actually happens. ## What it connects to Upstream: - **Defect log** (not in the catalogue yet) — The per-stage entered/advanced counts this tracker needs are exactly what a defect log already records — this tool turns that log into a stage-by-stage yield finding. Downstream: - **A3 problem solving** (`a3`) — Once the weakest stage is named, an A3 is where you'd run root cause analysis in depth if the fix isn't already obvious from the observation notes. ## Where AI helps Judgement — stays with you: - Deciding whether a stage's loss is worth acting on now or monitoring for a pattern first - Committing to which countermeasure to act on first Analysis — AI helps: - Drafting the narrative from observation notes and the weakest-stage finding - Pressure-testing whether a proposed countermeasure actually addresses the named weakest stage Drudgery — automated: - Computing every stage's conversion rate and the rolled yield, with the arithmetic shown - Identifying the weakest stage from stage data - Exporting to xlsx in the house format --- First-pass yield tracker is licensed [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Attribution: Katafacts (katafacts.com). ## Using this skill Apply this method as part of whatever broader task, instructions, or deliverable you're already working on -- it's a method to use, not a standalone conversation to start. There is no generation tool for this catalogue yet, so draft the artifact's actual content yourself, following the fields above, the same way a person filling this out by hand would. The canonical guide page and a downloadable worked example (.xlsx) are at https://www.katafacts.com/katas/first-pass-yield-tracker.