Timeline
1 year, 6 months
Role
Design Lead, Google Workspace (formerly G Suite)
Launched
May, 2018
Overview
I led the design of Google's device management offering. I designed Google Admin's device listing, details, setup, settings, and rules pages. I also launched features on the iOS Device Policy app employees use to access work apps.
Who are device admins?
To identify who does device administration in a large enterprise, I partnered with a researcher to interview 16 admins from 11 large companies. We also conducted a survey with 261 respondents. We had participants describe their workflows and pain points when it comes to managing devices at their company.
From our research, we learned that there are lots of people involved in managing devices. Employees at all levels of IT and security may be involved in device adminstration. Every company is a little different in how they divide up the work and every company has a different combination of device types and operating systems. We also learned that the end user (employee) experience is important to admins. Their top priority is securing company data, but their second priority is making sure employees have easy access to their work.
The Problem
Employees want to access work on the go. They use a wide array of device types from iOS and Android to Windows, Mac, and Chrome. Their company may provide a device for them or they may need to use their own personal device. Enterprises want to make sure the work data remains secure on all devices.
The design challenge was creating an admin experience that supports different operating systems with different security capabilities, but has a consistent and unified look and feel and easy troubleshooting when an employee loses access.
The Solution
We launched a new admin experience for device management that included a dashboard to view all of the different devices and settings an admin may be managing. It also includes a list of all of their devices and a rules feature that lets them set complex rules across their device fleet.
Google offers multiple management options. In our research, we found it wasn't always clear to admins what each level of management could do. We added a helpful overview flyout to make that clear for admins.
The Outcome
Since launch, adoption of Google's device management offering has grown exponentially. We've seen large companies with complex security policies successfully adopt the product. We also have helped smaller companies enforce password requirements with the basic management offering. The percent of Workspace devices with Google device management increases daily, which means employees are able to access their work on the go and admins are easily able to enforce security requirements like having a password across all their device types.
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