Reshaping Cloud Quota Management UX

Timeline

2023 - 2025

Role

Product Designer

Team

Research, Engineer, PM

Tasks

User Research, Design Strategy, UI Design

Overview

Azure is Microsoft’s cloud platform that enables users to run and manage cloud resources. Quota management (controlling limits for cloud usage) has long been a known friction point, impacting both user productivity and business efficiency.

In this project, I led the UX strategy to bridge these needs. I established user foundation, aligned teams on a shared vision, and uncovered design opportunities to transform the quota experience.

Impacts

  • Enabled execution of multiple UX initiatives grounded in user insights and strategy
  • Shaped a future vision (including AI opportunities) and aligned cross-functional teams
  • Increased CSAT from 25% → 75%
  • Reduced quota-related issues by 70%
  • Cut cloud workflow failures by 50%

Year

2023 - 2025

My role

Designer

Team

Research, Engineer, PM

Reshaping Cloud Quota Management UX

Year

2023 - 2025

My role

Designer

Team

Research, Engineer, PM

What's been done

Azure is Microsoft’s cloud platform that enables users to run and manage cloud resources. Quota management has long been a known pain point within the Azure experience.

In this project, I led UX strategy efforts to establish user foundation, align teams on a shared vision, and uncover design opportunities to improve the complex quota workflow.

Impacts

  • Shaped a future vision (including AI opportunities) and aligned cross-functional teams
  • Enabled execution of multiple UX initiatives grounded in user insights and strategy
  • Increased CSAT from 25% → 75%
  • Reduced quota and capacity issues by 70%
  • Cut cloud workflow failures by 50%

My Role

  • Identified systemic UX gaps in Azure’s quota management that blocked both user success and business efficiency.
  • Led a strategic shift from isolated feature fixes to holistic, user-centered product vision.
  • Built the UX foundation, aligning teams and informing the product roadmap, including future Copilot AI integration.

Challenges and goals

Quota management was a high-friction problem space — but no one had a clear view of the real issue

Initially, I tackled data-backed pain points by improving existing features.

But I soon discovered the real blocker wasn’t missing functionality. It was a gap in understanding. Teams were misaligned on how the system worked and how users actually experienced it.

Goal: To design the right solution, we first had to step back and build a shared understanding of the problem, the system, and our users.

Rethinking the approach

Establish a shared understanding of the system and user pain points—laying the foundation for aligned, effective design decisions. is some text inside of a div block.

Approach

I reframed the problem space, aligning teams around user insight and long-term strategy.

To move beyond fragmented fixes, I applied systems thinking to uncover user needs, expose organizational misalignment, and create a scalable foundation for future UX work.

1. User Foundation Discovery

Partnered with UX researcher to establish a clear understanding of users and their pain points:

  • Conducted in-depth interviews with users
  • Mapped friction across user types and org archetypes
  • Created cloud journey map with clarified user goals, flows, and failure points

2. Vision & Alignment

Defined UX strategies that balanced business priorities with user needs:

  • Facilitated team workshops to share UX understandings and align around key friction areas
  • Defined a long-term UX vision with prioritized quick-win tracks

3. Design Execution

Translated strategies into actionable design opportunities:

  • Delivered north star experience concepts
  • Identified Copilot AI guidance as a key execution opportunity

1. User Foundation Discovery

Establishing a shared understanding of user needs

First, I partnered with researchers to build a common foundation of user understanding across teams. Together, we uncovered the goals, behaviors, and failure patterns behind quota friction.

This work transformed misalignment into momentum, giving teams a clear and user-driven direction. Here’s the process:

Defining User Segmentation & Role Clarification

Through rounds of in-depth interviews with users and PMs, we clarified user roles, segment high-friction org types, and understand the mental models, and pain points.

Outcome: These insights defined who to prioritize and what needs to address first.

Visualizing Insights into Journey Map

Using the JTBD framework, I mapped the end-to-end customer journey to show how users navigate cloud workflows and where system-level friction occurs in quota-related tasks.

Outcome: Created a shared view of the complex system, serving as a source of truth and enabling cross-functional alignment across product, design, and engineering.

Identifying Additional Friction Points via UX Audit

In parallel, I audited the current experience to uncover usability gaps and inconsistencies, including unclear UX flows, confusing interaction patterns, and fragmented UI conventions.

Outcome: Framed these findings as strategic design opportunities that not only improved the overall experience but also helped the team recognize priorities, align on needs, and secure stakeholder buy-in.

2. Vision & Alignment

Turning user insights into strategy

Then, I shifted from discovery to synthesizing insights and shaping a clear product direction. By collaborating across teams, I turned research findings into actionable opportunities that guided our UX strategy.

Opportunity Framing

I transformed key pain points into actionable opportunities, validated through a survey of 100+ users.

Outcome: Surfaced high-impact opportunities forming the foundation of the UX direction.

Team Workshops

I facilitated cross-team workshops to align on priorities and brainstorm solutions, giving teams clarity on where to start and how to move forward.

Outcome: Drove both tactical execution and long-term direction through collaborative prioritization.

High Impact Opportunity

How might we empower users to independently resolve quota issues while improving guidance, transparency, and visibility into the quota system?

3. Design Execution

Translating strategy into solutions

With alignment secured,  I translated this vision into actionable solutions, delivering both quick wins and long-term improvements.

Quick Wins

Improving Guidance, Efficiency, and Transparency in Quota Management

I generated cross-team buy-in by sharing early findings, enabling the team to quickly prioritize low-effort, high-impact improvements in the Azure portal.

These focused on three key themes: Guidance, Efficiency, and Transparency.

Design Solution / Guidance

Guide users through key tools

Use the “Get Started” section to help users navigate quota services. Highlight essential features that support visibility, usage monitoring, and better quota decision-making.

Design Solution / Guidance

Surface key quota insights at a glance

Snapshot view offers users quick access to alerts, forecasts, and recent requests, helping them stay informed and make smarter decisions around quota planning.

Design Solution / Efficiency

Save filter sets

Enable users to save custom filter sets, making it faster and easier to revisit views tailored to their needs.

Design Solution / Efficiency

Cross-subscription selection

Allow users to manage quotas across multiple subscriptions, increasing flexibility and improving visibility for better decision-making.

Design Solution / Transparency

Improved entry point to request history

Improve visibility into past quota requests with clearer entry points and request status updates, helping users track progress with confidence.

Design Solution / Transparency

Estimated cost preview for better decisions

Display estimated costs upfront to help users make informed decisions when submitting quota requests.

Long-term Design

Integrating Copilot for Smarter Guidance and Recommendations

In shaping the long-term vision, I designed an AI-powered Copilot experience to deliver contextual guidance and actionable recommendations within cloud workflows

➡️ See how I brought this vision to life →[Bringing AI Guidance to Cloud Workflows]

Design solution / Copilot

Get real-time troubleshooting support with Copilot

Enable users to get instant explanations and step-by-step guidance when quota-related errors occur, helping reduce friction and unblock errors.

Design solution / Copilot

Check capacity status proactively with Copilot

Allow users to check real-time capacity availability and avoid deployment failures, reducing guesswork and improving confidence.

Takeaways

A strong user foundation unlocks real impact Clarifying roles, needs, and workflows allowed the team to move from scattered fixes to cohesive, user-centered solutions.

UX strategy helps navigate ambiguity
When product direction was unclear, reframing the problem from the user’s perspective brought clarity and alignment.

Next Steps

Build a shared UX strategy playbook
Document frameworks to help other teams adopt a similar approach.A strong user foundation unlocks real impact.

More work this way

Microsoft, Azure
Reshaping Cloud Quota Management UX
MicrosofT, Azure
Bringing AI Guidance to Cloud Workflows
Microsoft, AI
Designing for Responsible AI at Scale
Microsoft, m365
Streamlining M365 Adoption Through Better Self-Guided UX
Personal project
A Minimal Scorekeeping App
© 2025 Julie K in Seattle, WA
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Reshaping Cloud Quota Management UX

Problem

The cloud quota management experience was fragmented and reactive. Without a strong understanding of user, the design team struggled to confidently solve the right problems or improve the overall experience.

Solution

Led a strategic shift from feature-driven fixes to a user-centered design approach — building a strong user foundation through research & delivered short-term UX improvements and long-term Copilot-powered solutions aligned with real user needs.

Result

Established UX vision across the team — Reduced related support requests by 50%, Decreased cloud workflow failures by 70% & cut issue resolution time to under 2 minutes.

Role

Product designer

Scope

User research / UX design / UI design / Prototyping

Team

3 PDs, 1 UXR, 3 PMs, 3 Engs

Tool

Figma

Timeline

2024.05 - 2025.01

Role

Product designer

Scope

User research / UX design / UI design / Prototyping

Timeline

2024.05 - 2025.01

Tool

Figma

Overview

From feature-driven fixes to user-centered strategy

I worked with the Azure Design Team to improve quota and capacity management experiences.

Early on, I tackled surface-level issues. But I soon realized the real challenge wasn’t missing features—it was a lack of clarity around who our users were and how they worked.

So I led a shift toward a user-centered approach by building a strong foundation through research. This helped the team see the bigger picture and focus on long-term solutions.

  • Built clear user foundation (roles, needs, journeys)
  • Identified key opportunities and led North Star vision
  • Designed core features like Copilot to improve efficiency

Initial approach

Started by improving features based on data-backed pain points

UX Chellenge

But the experience still felt fragmented — and I wasn’t sure if I was solving the right problem

  • The cloud workflow was highly complex, making it difficult to see the full picture
  • The fixes felt fragmented — more like surface-level patches than experience improvements
  • Lacking clarity on key elements like user roles, goals, and flows
  • Without a strong user foundation, it was hard to design holistically or confidently improve the experience

UX Strategy

Reframing the problem through a user-centered lens — by building a stronger foundation and redefining who we were designing for

  • Identify more impactful, long-term opportunities
  • Move beyond surface fixes toward solving the root causes
  • Align solutions with real user needs and workflows

Building user foundation

Understanding user through research

I partnered with the researcher to conduct rounds of in-depth interview to understand the user journey, target segmentation, user painpoints and needs.

Problem 1
01
Delays
Manual handling of issues slows progress
Problem 2
02
Interrupted Workflows
Issues & poor management  disrupting cloud operations
Problem 3
03
User Frustration
Delays and disruptions reduce productivity

Creating a customer journey map

I created a customer journey map to identify friction points and opportunities for improvement, developed through previous interviews.

Problem 1
01
Delays
Manual handling of issues slows progress
Problem 2
02
Interrupted Workflows
Issues & poor management  disrupting cloud operations
Problem 3
03
User Frustration
Delays and disruptions reduce productivity

Short-Term UX Improvements

Executed actionable quick wins based on early UX findings

I led initial improvements based on findings from a UX audit, focusing on Efficiency, Transparency, and Guidance. These early updates were part of a strategic approach to address visible pain points, build team alignment, and pave the way for long-term solutions.

Pain Points

•

Lack of visibility into why requests are denied or what causes failures

•

Long approval times for quota requests

•

Hard to predict how much cloud capacity is needed

•

Not understanding why quota requests are denied

•

Early requests don’t always guarantee capacity, leading to deployment delays

•

Hard to know when and which region/zone will be unavailable

Desired Outcomes

•

Identify the cause of allocation failures and fix them independently

•

Get fast approval for quota requests

•

Ensure capacity is guaranteed for approved quotas

•

Understand why quota requests are denied and find alternative solutions

•

Have capacity guaranteed for approved quota

•

Know which capacity will be unavailable and for how long

* A user survey with 100 participants | A workshop with 30 PMs & Engs

Needs to Focus on for Solution

Users need clear guidance, visibility, and reliable tools to troubleshoot quota and capacity issues efficiently and confidently

Long-Term Vision

Identifying high-impact solution through collaborative work

After identifying key pain points, I partnered with researchers to define meaningful outcomes.We ran an opportunity survey with 100 users to understand which outcomes mattered most—measuring both importance and current satisfaction. This helped us prioritize user needs based on opportunity scores.

To bring these insights to life, I facilitated a collaborative workshop with over 30 PMs and engineers, where we aligned on problems and began exploring potential solutions.

Copilot

Integrate Copilot for faster issue diagnosis and alternative solutions

Resolved Issues

Users often face deployment failures without clear visibility into what went wrong or how to fix it. By integrating Copilot into the workflow, we can help users quickly understand the issue, explore alternative paths, and reduce frustration and delays.

Outcomes

Reduce customer pain time to under 2 minutes | 70% reduction in allocation failure

Learnings

Here are my key learning from designing conversational AI experiences:

  • Keep conversations concise and efficient. Reduce unnecessary back-and-forth by bundling related questions, helping users reach solutions faster.
  • Trigger Copilot in the right context. Users value Copilot only when it’s surfaced at meaningful moments. Embedding it in specific workflows (e.g., during capacity planning) is more effective than offering it generically.
  • Offer clear next steps. Guiding users with actionable, immediate options.
  • Explain the “why”.  Increase trust and transparency by clarifying why the AI is asking something or making a suggestion.

Project Outcome and Learnings

Key Contribution & Impact

I led the team in adopting a user-centered approach by leveraging insights to shape product decisions—like integrating Copilot—and laying the groundwork for future design improvements.
‍
I also helped define the North Star vision to reimagine the end-to-end capacity management journey with UX/UI improvements .
‍
As a result:
Increase CSAT from 25% → 75%
‍Achieve a 70% reduction in quota/capacity issues
See a 50% drop in deployment failures

Lesson learned

Navigating uncertainty. Partnering with researchers, I mapped the full user journey for cloud capacity management. This clarified key pain points and actions, enabling strategic, user-centered decisions. The process strengthened my skills in research, design thinking, and long-term product strategy—reinforcing the value of taking a holistic approach to complex challenges.

BriefIntroContextFeature design NorthStar design AI design Key learnings
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Transforming the Cloud Capacity Management Experiences

July '23 - Jan '25 • Microsoft Azure
context
Azure is Microsoft’s cloud platform, serving over 350,000 business customers and reaching 1 billion users worldwide. Cloud capacity, also known as Quotas, refers to usage limits assigned to users for accessing cloud services efficiently.

In July 2023, I joined the team, leading design and shaping the strategy for the cloud management experience.
Project summary
Problem
How might we enable users to manage cloud capacity and resolve related issues more efficiently?
Final outcome
Shaped the North Star vision for capacity management by leveraging deep research and strategic collaboration
Impact in numbers
< 2 min
In customer pain time
- 70%
Reduce in allocation failure
- 50%
Reduce in capacity-related issues
ℹ️ Below is summary of the design, and I’m happy to share more detailed progress upon request. Contact me: hwak26@gmail.com
Context
Main challenges to solve
As more companies move to the cloud, Azure sets capacity limits for fair and efficient usage.  While necessary, these limits caused challenges for users and businesses.
how bad is the problem?
$800
per issues resolution
2nd
biggest customer pain point
49%
of users experience capacity-related issues
Data showed that capacity limits became the product’s second-biggest customer pain point, driving high operational costs. Survey research revealed that 49% of users faced issues with capacity-related issues.
Opportunities
How could we provide flexibility and clear guidance to help users resolve capacity-related issues efficiently?
Strategy
Given the product’s complexity, I needed a deeper understanding of users to develop effective design solutions and improve the cloud capacity management experience. This led the team to initiate deep-dive research to better understand our customers, map the product journey, identify where users encounter capacity-related issues, and define the product North Star.
Research findings
Understanding the journey and identifying touchpoints
I collaborated with researcher to conduct multiple interview rounds with stakeholders and customers, identifying following key area: 
  • End-to-end vision of the cloud journey, mapping user roles (e.g., DevOps, Developers) and role-specific stages, along with key touchpoints related to cloud capacity.
  • Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) — outlining key tasks and goals users need to accomplish at each stage of their journey.
  • User pain points — identifying specific challenges users face while trying to achieve their JTBD goals.
Based on these insights, I created an interactive customer journey map to consolidate findings, facilitate discussions, and serve as a validation tool for future design processes.
Auditing
I also led in conducting a heuristic evaluation of the current experience, identifying key themes: guidance, efficiency, and transparency
Northstar design
getting buy-ins for Northstar design
To strategically drive the long-term North Star vision, I first established short-term design goals as a tactical approach to gain stakeholder buy-in and influence future product direction. I successfully secured approval for 3 out of 7 features, advancing short-term improvements and reinforcing support for the North Star design
#1 - Improved Guidance
#2 - Improved efficiency
#3 - Improved Transparency
Identifying long-term opportunities
To define long-term opportunities, I implemented the following strategies in collaboration with cross-functional teams.
What are the top opportunities?
I collaborated with researchers to identify key opportunities through surveys, gathering insights on users’ most desired outcomes.
How can we tackle the opportuntnies?
Then to tackle the top customer needs, Through brainstorming sessions with 37 stakeholders and used impact and effort analysis to prioritize key opportunities.

‍This also increased project awareness, bringing stakeholders together to shape product strategies that align with customer needs and opportunities.
What are themes among the ideas?
Guidance
Self-troubleshoot
Via the session, I was able to uncovered key themes: improving guidance and enabling users to self-troubleshoot capacity-related issues. ‍
Integrating Copilot design & collaborating with teams across the organization
One of the key ideas that emerged from the brainstorming session was integrating Copilot as a long-term design goal. I took the initiative to create the design and, as the Copilot landscape continues to evolve, collaborated with the Copilot design team to ensure the best use of its capabilities. I also presented the design to the engineering team to evaluate feasibility and validity while working closely with other teams developing similar experiences.
Learning
Guiding through uncertainty UX
I addressed significant ambiguity around userand workflows by collaborating with researchers to map the end-to-end user journey. This comprehensive vision clarified key touchpoints, pain points, and actions in cloud capacity management, serving as a foundation for future design work. It empowered the broader team to make informed product decisions and set a clear direction for long-term, user-centered improvements.

This experience strengthened my skills as a designer by highlighting the value of research, strategic visioning, and an ecosystem-wide perspective in tackling complex projects.