Product Leaders to Watch: Unity Product Leader on Guiding Product Teams to Success

  • Podcast Podcast
  • February 16, 2024
Marc-André Ferguson

Unity, Staff Product Manager

Member

How can product leaders guide teams to success? In this episode of the Product Leaders to Watch Series with Cognizant Product Director Chenny Solaiyappan, Unity Product Leader Marc-Andre Ferguson speaks on his diverse career path from filmmaking to product management roles at companies such as Autodesk and Unity. He emphasizes the importance of clear communication, teamwork, and understanding different perspectives to build trust within cross-functional teams. He discusses the potential of generative AI and the importance of user experience, security, and lifelong learning for product managers.

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Show Notes

  1. Guiding product teams to success requires respect for everyone’s craft and roles in cross-functional teams.
  2. Clear communication of goals, objectives, and roadmaps is key for teams.
  3. Empathy, listening, and understanding different perspectives builds trust.
  4. Product managers should guide product teams to success with respect, not authority.
  5. Agile development requires adaptability to changing priorities and milestones.
  6. User experience and viability are important factors in a great product.
  7. Generative AI could help scale development through testing automation.
  8. Applications supporting energy transition are an exciting area for innovation.
  9. Products should balance AI with human oversight for safety and trust.
  10. Customer experience encompasses the entire journey from discovery to support.
  11. Turning users into loyal customers builds long-term viability.
  12. Security and data privacy are especially important in industries like healthcare.
  13. Lifelong learning helps product managers stay up-to-date on trends.
  14. Communication and negotiation skills are valuable soft skills.
  15. Understanding business needs and financial outcomes is important.
  16. Behavioral psychology insights can improve understanding of users and teams.
  17. Defending product decisions requires courage, empathy and credibility.
  18. Books on varied topics aid career and skill development for product managers.
  19. Adapting to new teams and industries builds mutual understanding.
  20. Podcasts share valuable lessons and perspectives on product leadership.

About the speaker

Marc-André Ferguson
Unity, Staff Product Manager

Product leader, problem solver, coach, dad.
After 15 years in film and TV production, I moved to software as a designer, eventually to Product Management. I spent the last 15 years in both large companies (Autodesk, Unity) and startups (LANDR, Potloc, Contxtful).
I give back through coaching and teaching with APM Canada.
I sometimes break into song.

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About the host

Chenny Solaiyappan
Mphasis, Vice President

Chenny Solaiyappan is a seasoned product and venture leader with nearly three decades of experience building and scaling enterprise healthcare and government technology platforms. He is currently Vice President, Products at Mphasis, where he is focused on transforming core claims administration platforms into scalable, AI-enabled learning health system for the commercial, self-funded, and TPA markets.

Previously, Chenny spent over 15 years at Cognizant’s TriZetto Product House, where he founded, built, and scaled the ClaimSphere® suite of products and pioneered the Quality-as-a-Service (QaaS) business model. His work helped health plans unlock more than $1B in value-based payments, while repositioning quality measurement from a regulatory obligation into a Learning Health System. Today, ClaimSphere supports tens of millions of lives across leading U.S. health plans.

A recognized thought leader in value-based care, digital quality measurement (dQM), HEDIS, CMS Stars, FHIR interoperability, and population health analytics, Chenny has played a key industry role as HL7 Da Vinci Business Co-Chair for the TriZetto portfolio. He regularly speaks at national forums including NCQA, RISE, AHIP, INFORMS, and Health Plan Alliance.

Chenny is also the host of the Care Catalyst Podcast, where he interviews healthcare executives, innovators, and policymakers on the future of whole-person care, AI, and health equity. He brings an Entrepreneur-in-Residence mindset to large enterprises—combining strategy, product execution, and storytelling to transform complex systems into scalable, customer-centric platforms.

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