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Tom Verrilli

What Tom Verrilli thinks about management

@tom-verrilli · 24 positions · On ppll ↗

Chief product officer at the live-shopping marketplace Whatnot, previously chief product officer at Twitch and a product lead on growth at Twitter.

Tom Verrilli did not write this page.

We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.

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Only Tom Verrilli on management. See everyone on management

6 dated positions, 2026, in their own words. Our reading of what Tom Verrilli has said — not written or endorsed by them.

  1. Our readingThe industry's promotion ladder took its best product people and promoted them out of doing the work.

    Their wordswhat you did if you were really successful as a PM is you got promoted into being a director and then all of a sudden it was like don't be hands-on anymore. Your goal goal is just to coach and guide. And so, we took all of our A players and then promoted them out of doing things.

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 8th of 24 in this recording

  3. Our readingA product leader writing production code is not the best use of their time, even though they should be able to read the codebase.

    Their wordshave I personally shipped some production code and whatnot? Yes. Uh do I think that's really the best use of my time? Not really.

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 10th of 24 in this recording

  5. Our readingThe right posture toward your own team is verify then trust, not trust but verify.

    Their wordswe tend to live in a verify then trust land as opposed to a like totally trust or even trust but verify

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 16th of 24 in this recording

  7. Our readingTop-down product leadership works when the leader is in the weeds; what people call micromanagement is a leader directing work without knowing ground truth.

    Their wordsTop-down works well if leadership is good enough to be in the weeds and be specifically correct. I think where it falls apart is where you don't actually know ground truth and then you attempt to manage people from above and that's where I think the term micromanagement comes from.

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 18th of 24 in this recording

  9. Our readingWhen nobody in the room has data, the chief executive's opinion should win, and that is fine.

    Their wordsif it nobody's got data, it's just two opinions, the CEO's opinion is going to win.

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 19th of 24 in this recording

  11. Our readingWhen a decision is called too complex to make, the real explanation is almost always weak leadership.

    Their wordswhat I definitely learned is like most of the time you hear it's really complex. It isn't. Leadership's just weak.

    ↗This CPO regrets that product management exists | Tom Verrilli (CPO of Whatnot)youtube.com 23rd of 24 in this recording