Ohno-style 5 whys root-cause analysis
OfficialOfficial · updated Nov 4, 2026 · v1.0.1
Finds the root cause of a problem with the 5 whys Taiichi Ohno illustrated: a measured gap, a chain of whys with evidence at each step, and a fix for the cause, not the symptom.
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When to use it
- An incident, defect or missed delivery needs a root cause
- The same problem keeps coming back after it was fixed
What you give it
- The problem and the standard it missed
- Logs, timelines and records
- What has been tried
- Who can confirm missing facts
What you get
A why-chain table with evidence per step, a read-back check, the root cause, containment and root-cause countermeasures with owners, and how you'll know it worked.
Changelog
- v1.0.1 · Nov 4, 2026 · Example output now opens with the attribution and not-affiliated lines, as the skill's own checks require.
- v1.0.0 · Nov 4, 2026 · First release.
Sources
- 5 Whys - Lean Enterprise Institute lexicon (2026-11-04)
- Toyota Production System - Toyota Motor Corporation (2026-11-04)
Related skills
- Team retrospective Runs a team retro from notes or a survey: themes, root causes with 5 whys, and 1 to 3 experiments with an owner and review date.
- Bug report from a support ticket Turns a customer complaint into an engineering-ready bug report: steps to reproduce, expected vs actual, environment, impact, evidence, and questions to ask.
- Incident notice for customers Writes customer-facing incident notices by stage, from investigating to resolved, and a postmortem summary with a plain apology and what changes.
- Ohno-style seven wastes review Walks one process step by step, sorts it into value-creating work, incidental work and Taiichi Ohno's seven wastes, ranks the wastes and proposes what to remove first.