Episode 265: How Marketplace Teams Decide What to Build

Episode notes

Creating great product organizations takes more than setting roadmaps. It requires clear priorities, shared decision-making, and a strong sense of what makes the business uniquely valuable. In this episode, Melissa Perri brings together insights from three product leaders on how teams can create focus, alignment, and clarity as they scale. You’ll hear from Kristin Dorsett, Chief Product Officer at Viator at the time, on balancing top-down priorities with bottom-up autonomy and why doing fewer things at once leads to more meaningful progress. Craig Saldanha, Chief Product Officer at Yelp, explains how explicit product principles help teams make better decisions and stay aligned, especially in a two-sided marketplace. Mauricio Monico reflects on lessons from eBay and Wish, including the risks of copying competitors, the importance of explaining strategy clearly across the organization, and why turnarounds often begin by fixing marketplace fundamentals before chasing growth. Together, these perspectives offer a practical look at how product leaders create alignment without losing adaptability.