How can product leaders deliver customer value? In this episode of the Product Leaders to Watch series with Cognizant Product Director Chenny Solaiyappan, S&P Global Executive Product Director Jamie Matlin shares insights from his experiences building desktop and mobile products. He speaks on the importance of taking a design-led and customer-centric approach to product development. Jamie also shares his thoughts on trends in generative AI, fintech, and data visualization. He discusses what makes a great product – solving problems and delivering customer value through minimalistic design and intuitive user experiences.
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Show Notes
- Take a design-led and customer-centric approach to product development, especially for mobile products.
- Hire industry experts to serve as proxy users when direct customer interviews aren’t possible.
- Generative AI is an exciting trend with potential to simplify experiences and better address market problems through analysis, research, and search.
- FinTech and data visualization are areas of opportunity.
- A great product solves market problems and delivers customer value.
- Minimalistic design and intuitive user experiences are attributes of a great product.
- Adding new features is exciting, but regularly evaluating what to remove is also important to maintain focus and simplicity.
- Customer centricity is key – everything should revolve around understanding and serving the user.
- Collaborating early and throughout the process with business and development stakeholders is paramount to mitigating risk and ensuring success.
- The product manager role depends on factors like product, market, and company culture.
- Customer centricity and bringing stakeholders along are qualities of a great product manager,
- Soft skills and mindset are just as important as hard skills for product managers.
About the speaker
Passionate Fintech product leader with a track record of creating and managing high-value content and data products for desktop and mobile. Advocates for a customer-centric and design-first product-build culture.
About the host
Chenny Solaiyappan is the Director of Product Management for Cognizant Trizetto's Government and Quality Solutions, and a founding member of the ClaimSphere suite of products, encompassing quality, HEDIS ®, CMS Stars, and clinical solutions. An accomplished Intrapreneur and Lean Startup Practitioner, he plays a pivotal role in shaping the overall product strategy and serves as the HL7 DaVinci Business Co-chair. With a notable track record, Chenny has provided consultancy to over 30 health plans across the nation, consistently raising Quality and Star ratings in Medicaid, Medicare, Federal Employees Health Plan, and Commercial health plan sectors, collectively supporting 30 million lives. His outstanding leadership and innovative contributions have earned him prestigious awards, including the 2023 Top 20 Global Product Manager Award by Products That Count, as well as the 2021 and 2019 Product of the Year awards by Cognizant Trizetto.