1 min lesson
Agree the dictionary up front
Use "Agree the dictionary up front" to explain each part and the role it plays.
Step 1 of 2
Agree the dictionary up frontkill the re-litigation
Most cost disputes are definition disputes wearing a costume. Does "cost per user" mean per active user or per paid seat? Does COGS include the idle reserved baseline or only used capacity? Nail these once in a shared metric dictionary and you stop re-arguing them every month.
Definitions worth pinning before anything else
- Active user
- Pick one: DAU, MAU or paid seat - and use it everywhere
- COGS boundary
- Does it include reserved-but-idle capacity? State it once.
- Cost period
- Match Finance's close cadence, not your dashboard's refresh
- Attribution grain
- Team, feature or environment - at the granularity Finance reports
A shared dictionary is the cheapest insurance against endless re-litigation.