What the dashboard is for.
A production dashboard is the screen that tells you, every day, what the line produced, what it lost and why: with OEE updated every morning, yesterday's loss gets fixed today instead of showing up in the month end report.
It answers three questions, in this order:
- Did we deliver? Output against demand.
- Where did we lose? Stops, speed, scrap.
- What do we fix first? The cause that costs the most minutes.
The KPIs to track.
A handful of KPIs is enough, as long as they are always counted the same way:
| KPI | Formula | What it tells you | Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|
| OEE | Fully productive time ÷ planned production time | The share of planned time that made good parts | Every day |
| Availability, performance, quality | The three OEE factors | Where the loss is | Every day |
| Output against demand | Good parts − demand | Whether you keep up with orders | Every day |
| Scrap rate | Scrapped parts ÷ total parts | First pass quality | Every day |
| Takt time | Available time ÷ demand | The pace to hold | With every forecast |
| MTBF | Operating time ÷ number of failures | How often failures happen | Every week or month |
| MTTR | Repair time ÷ number of failures | How fast you restart | Every week or month |
| Stops by cause | Minutes of stop per cause, ranked | The causes to tackle first | Every week |
To go from day to week, add up the times, then divide. The average of seven daily OEE figures gives the same weight to a 2 hour day and a 16 hour day.
Each formula in detail, with a free calculator: OEE, MTBF and MTTR, takt time.
Building the dashboard.
Set the counting rules
What planned production time, a failure (from how many minutes) and a good part are. Written once, applied by every team.
One source per figure
Parts from the ERP or the machine, stops from the shift sheet, failures from the CMMS. A single source is the reference for each figure.
One entry per day and per line
The same format every day, for every line. That is what makes days and lines comparable.
Calculations as formulas
KPIs are computed from the inputs, with no manual touch-up. A figure corrected by hand can no longer be traced.
A short review every morning
In front of the dashboard: yesterday's loss, its cause, the action and who owns it.
The free Excel template.
The template follows this method. Three sheets:
- How to use: the counting rules and what each column holds.
- Input: one row per day and per machine (opening time, planned stops, breakdowns and setups, number of failures, repairs, ideal cycle time, total and good parts, demand). OEE, its three factors and takt time are computed on every row.
- Summary: per machine and per week, OEE computed on the sum of times, MTBF, MTTR, output against demand.
Example data shows the calculation: replace it with your own.
Get the Excel template
Enter your first name, email and phone number: the download link arrives by email within a minute.
Excel, software or automation.
Three ways to feed the dashboard:
| Option | How it works | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|
| Excel template | Manual input every day, formulas do the maths | One or a few lines, to get started |
| Production tracking software (MES) | Sensors or terminals on the machines, real time data | Shops that want real time, machine by machine |
| Automatic consolidation | Existing exports (ERP, CMMS, spreadsheets) collected and computed every day | Teams that already have the data, spread across several tools |
The third option is what we do. We built it for Maeva & Co, a property management company: exports are collected, figures computed and the dashboard consolidated every 24 hours, with no manual re-entry. More than 400 hours freed up per year. The same mechanism applies to exports from an ERP or a CMMS.
Production dashboard: what people ask us.
Which KPIs belong on a production dashboard?
OEE and its three factors (availability, performance, quality), output against demand, scrap rate, MTBF, MTTR and stops ranked by cause. Together they cover volume, quality and maintenance without overloading the screen.
How do you track production in Excel?
One input row per day and per machine (times, stops, failures, total and good parts), then the KPIs as formulas in columns and a summary sheet. Our free Excel template is built that way and you can get it by email from this page.
How often should the dashboard be updated?
Every day for OEE, output and scrap, so you can act while the cause is still visible. Every week or month for MTBF and MTTR, which need several failures to be readable.
Do you need production tracking software?
Production tracking software (an MES) makes sense when you need real time data machine by machine, with sensors. If the figures already exist in your ERP, CMMS or spreadsheets, consolidating them automatically every day is often enough.
How do you compute OEE for a week?
Add up the fully productive time of the week, then divide by the sum of planned production time. Do not average the daily OEE figures: a short day would weigh as much as a full one.