Deneva Goins
PRODUCT DESIGN CONSULTANT
Designing Infrastructure Intelligence at Scale
I led design for enterprise lifecycle systems that automated environment discovery, compliance checks, and upgrade readiness, escalating to administrators only when system certainty broke down.
The Stakes
VMware’s business was shifting to a subscription model, but customers resisted moving data center upgrades to the cloud due to system complexity and trust constraints. Manual upgrade paths and fragmented access controls made automation difficult and increased operational risk across environments.
Customers preferred to keep credentials on-premises, reflecting deep concerns about trust and security in the cloud.
Security & Trust
Design Strategy
To enable subscription adoption, I designed a centralized model for managing access and roles across on-prem and cloud environments. This addressed the primary trust blocker: fragmented role definitions and conflicting privileges across systems. By clarifying role semantics, standardizing permissions, and aligning to least-privilege principles, the platform could reliably enforce security and make cloud-managed upgrades viable.
Impact
Unified on-prem and cloud experiences through security and compliant lifecycle management. Partnered with customers and engineering teams to validate the vision and establish a scalable foundation for subscription adoption.
Increased Adoption
Removed entry barriers around security and lifecycle
Seamless Upgrades
Automated eligibility checks, upgrade at scale
Trial Conversions
Self service demos, free trials, white glove enterprise trials