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Week 4: Metric Design and Business Outcome Linkage · Lesson 4.6

Metric specifications, thresholds, baselines, and release criteria

What does good enough to ship mean in metric terms, and how do we prevent regressions?

Retired course. Due to the fast pace of AI, this course was retired before full release. Exercises, datasets, and videos referenced in this lesson are not available. The slide content and frameworks remain free to study.

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Reader Notes

This is where evaluation turns into ship decisions. The metrics exist. The baselines exist. Now contracts are needed. A metric spec defines exactly what is measured, how it is aggregated, and who owns it. Release criteria define the thresholds that determine whether the system is good enough to ship. Without these contracts, ship decisions are negotiations where the loudest voice wins. Teams have spent 45 minutes in a room debating whether 74 percent is "good enough" with no framework. With contracts, there is a pre-registered decision framework. The rules are set before the data is examined. That phrase matters. Pre-registered.

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