Every data team knows the meeting. Finance says revenue grew 4%. Sales says 6%. Both pulled the number from the warehouse, both are right, and the next twenty minutes go to reconciling instead of deciding.

The definition drifts, not the data

Most disagreements come from small choices made in different places: whether refunds count, which timezone closes the month, whether a trial that converted on day 15 belongs to this cohort or the last one. Each choice is reasonable. Made twice, they produce two truths.

Define it once, use it everywhere

In Tessel a metric is defined once, with an owner and a description, and every question, chart and digest runs on that definition. When someone asks for revenue by region, the query starts from net_revenue, not from a fresh guess at the invoices table.

Start with the five numbers that come up in every leadership meeting. Write them down, name an owner for each and import them. The meeting gets shorter the same week.