Ryan Johnson¶
Professional Experience¶
Distinguished Engineer, Product Engineering¶
Remote - Home Office
Broadcom: November 2023 - Present (Distinguished Engineer)
VMware: August 2022 – November 2023 (Senior Staff Solutions Architect)
November 2017 – August 2022 (Staff II Solutions Architect)
- Co-author and architect of the detailed designs and prescriptive implementation guidance published as the VMware Validated Solutions, formerly VMware Validated Designs, enabling adoption of private and hybrid cloud solutions.
- Develops infrastructure-as-code examples using Terraform and PowerShell to accelerate the time-to-deploy for solutions.
- Maintainer of the multiple Terraform providers and Packer plugins.
- Identifies opportunities to address gaps in integration, user experience, and feature capabilities for VMware cloud products.
- Creates enablement in multiple mediums, including technical presentations, blog articles, demo videos, and conceptual graphics.
- Collaborates with Information Experience technical writers to ensure the highest quality documentation and experience.
- Collaborates with product management and engineering teams across business groups on product features, user experience, issues, documentation, and prioritization.
- Collaborates with other solution architects and engineering teams to review customer and partner private cloud designs and operational procedures, provide guidance, recommendations, and feedback.
- Engages directly with customer and field teams to enable success in the adoption of private and hybrid cloud solutions.
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Subject matter expert and trusted advisor for the solution stack to both engineering and field teams.
Notable Contributions
- Pivot of VMware Validated Designs to VMware Validated Solutions, co-architect.
- Convergence of VMware Validated Designs content to VMware Cloud Foundation product documentation, co-author.
- VMware Validated Solutions:
- Identity and Access Management for VMware Cloud Foundation, principal architect and author.
- Private Cloud Automation for VMware Cloud Foundation, principal architect and author.
- VMware Validated Designs:
- Co-author and architect of seven releases.
- Aria Automation design and implementation, principal architect and author.
- Workspace ONE Access design and implementation, principal architect and author.
- Aria Automation Cloud design (Early Access), principal architect and author.
- Aria Operations for Networks design (Early Access), principal architect and author.
- Pivotal PKS design (Early Access), principal architect and author.
- Key influencer on features and capabilities for lifecycle management of the Aria Suite.
- Concept and introduction of the Workspace ONE Access Broker to the private cloud solution stack, solutions architect (ongoing).
Staff Architect, Technical Marketing¶
VMware, Inc.
Remote - Home Office
November 2016 – November 2017 (Staff Architect-level)
July 2016 – November 2016 (Senior Architect-level)
November 2014 – July 2016 (Senior Manager-level)
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Expert and evangelist responsible for in-depth technical enablement, product launch, demonstrations, and conference sessions.
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VMware Validated Designs and VMware Cloud Foundation, principal expert.
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VMware vSphere - vCenter Server, Platform Services Controller, and vSphere certificate management, principal expert.
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Created enablement in multiple mediums, including technical presentations, blog articles, podcasts, posters, demo videos, conceptual animations, graphics, and hands-on labs.
- Collaborated with field resources to empower customers to adopt private and hybrid cloud technologies.
- Collaborated with partners to work on joint initiatives that showcase technologies alongside partner solutions.
- Collaborated with the product management and engineering teams on technical feedback from partners, customers, field on product features and prioritization.
- Co-host of the VMware Communities podcast 2015–2016.
Staff Technical Account Manager, Customer Success¶
VMware, Inc.
Remote - Home Office
July 2012 - November 2014 (Staff-level)
April 2010 - July 2012 (Senior-level)
- Customer success advocate providing the expertise, access, and commitment to maximize technology investments and accelerate adoption of cloud technologies.
- Developed relationships with customers working with C-level, directors, managers, and technology professionals.
- Accelerated standardization of VMware solutions by assessing customers environments, proactively recommending next steps, and troubleshooting unforeseen circumstances that may cause delay.
- Increased return on investment by driving momentum toward customer goals and aligning people and processes with proven practices.
- Provided products updates and roadmaps, including insight on future projects and direction.
- Project management, solutions architecture and consultative review of technology projects.
- Single point of accountability for escalations, issues, and requests across VMware product divisions and the partner community.
- Mitigated risk through in-depth technical knowledge with resources across VMware and the partner community.
- Collaborated with the product management and engineering teams providing clear and constructive feedback on customer requirements.
- Managed cross-functional project teams, which often consisted of VMware consultants and support staff.
- Marketing and event management for VMware TAM Program events at VMworld 2012 – 2014.
Enterprise Architect¶
Citizens Property Insurance Corporation
Tallahassee, Florida
July 2008 - April 2010
- Established the charter, strategy, services, and governance models for an Enterprise Architecture Program encompassing information, applications, and technology architecture domains.
- Responsible for establishing performance objectives for the program and reporting on accomplishments and activities.
- Led the program to collaborate with domain teams and working groups to establish standards and practices.
- Provided services to the Project Management Office to assess the project pipeline.
- Analyzed technology and business challenges, suggested solutions and assessed costs.
- Designed and deployed proofs-of-concepts for systems, including the business case, benefits, costs, and efficiency measures.
- Performed design and system analysis, requirements definitions, interface and data architectures, and governance.
- Collaborated with business experts and domain architects to convert strategic objectives into actionable designs and roadmaps.
- Collaborated with developers, project managers, and focus groups to minimize expenditure, avoid redundancies, and improve business outcomes.
- Accelerated the delivery of technology platforms and services while reducing risks and costs.
- Documented current, transition, and future architectures, with traceability from business outcomes to recommended technologies.
- Assisted in analyzing legacy systems and applications to derive necessary business rules and functions from existing applications.
Senior Systems Architect¶
Citizens Property Insurance Corporation
Tallahassee, Florida
January 2008 - July 2008 (Employee)
January 2006 - January 2008 (Contractor)
- Responsible for the architecture, engineering, and project management for enterprise technology projects.
- Developed project proposals, cost-benefit analysis, and project charters. Worked closely with business unit management, project management office, and solution providers in the development of project requirements. Developed statements of work, conducted kick-off and ongoing status meetings with project stakeholders.
- Created detailed work breakdown structures, activity sequencing, resource assignments, budget schedules, and procurement activities, such as, request for proposals, intent to bid or intent to negotiate documents. Developed project schedules, led work product reviews, facilitated team meetings in developing design documents and respective implementation/fallback plans and managed project resources to the project schedule while maintaining project scope and budget.
- Procured equipment and services per bill-of-materials in adherence with organization procurement and asset management policies. Managed appropriate communications with respect to change control, managed the cycle of system implementation, managed issues and kept teams focused on project objectives.
- Ensured operational control had been successfully completed as prepared in the transition to operations planning session(s). Maintained comprehensive issues and risk list. Prepared project change requests as required and obtained approval to all changes in scope and schedule. Managed resource calendar, team performance and client satisfaction.
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Ensured all deliverables were completed to statement of work and held lessons learned sessions with stakeholders.
Notable Projects and Accomplishments
- Enterprise Virtualization Services – Architected virtualization services platform for production, development, and disaster recovery using VMware, EMC, Cisco, and Veeam technology foundations.
- Enterprise Business Application Services – Architected comprehensive hosting services platform for externally facing business applications at both production and disaster recovery data centers. Migrated policy management, agency/agent management and web presence services from hosting facilities to the highly available, highly scalable hosting services platform.
- Enterprise Messaging Services – Microsoft Exchange services re-architecture, platform refresh and migration for 3000+ mailboxes including Symantec Enterprise Vault archive and McAfee Email Gateway security and encryption services.
- Enterprise Directory Services – Microsoft Active Directory service re-architecture collapsing multiple complex and legacy directory services domains into unified forest and domains architecture. Scope included the following: comprehensive Microsoft ADRAP and remediation steps; detailed requirements, planning, designs, implementations and risk management; comprehensive discovery and business applications testing, implemented service optimization and availability; and scripted/ADMT managed phased migrations of users, computers, groups, and policy objects.
- Enterprise File Services – Migration of managed My Documents to EMC Celerra NAS storage. Implementation of Riverbed Steelhead WAN Optimization Controllers in the network infrastructure core to ensure continuity of end-user experience across the enterprise.
Senior Enterprise Consulting Architect¶
Infinity Software Development
Tallahassee, Florida
May 2005 - December 2007
- Provided technology consulting services for delivery of software solutions and datacenter technology infrastructure.
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Architected application, messaging, and web hosting services for clients utilizing Microsoft technology foundations.
Notable Engagements
- Citizens Property Insurance Corporation – Architect and project manager for enterprise technology initiatives, such as, virtualization, storage, business applications, messaging, directory and file services.
- Florida Department of Agriculture – Architect of the statewide directory services and messaging architectures. Refined the architectures to ensure conformance to best practices and developed implementation roadmaps for migration to current releases.
- Florida State Senate – Consultant for the lifecycle of Citrix application services; upgraded, tested, validated, and documented all deployments to current releases.
- Florida Department of Financial Services – Consultant for Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft SQL Server technologies.
Senior Systems Engineer¶
Aderant
Tallahassee, Florida
June 2000 - May 2005
- Managed projects and delivered enterprise technology solutions for software development company.
- Integrated the networks and systems of multiple mergers and acquisitions to enterprise standards.
- Designed and engineered datacenters. Successfully moved and consolidated five datacenters and corporate offices with minimal interruption or downtime to customers and employees. Worked with vendors and contractors to provide service level agreements for carrier services.
- Developed and deployed standards, timelines, projects and systems for the global migration of Microsoft Active Directory and Microsoft Exchange services for offices in North America, Asia/Pacific and Europe.
- Designed and managed global network using Cisco security, switching and routing technologies.
- Responsible for operations, maintenance, and upgrades of: Microsoft SQL Server; SAN and backup systems; antivirus, anti-malware and patch management systems; web content management systems; global Microsoft Active Directory and Microsoft Exchange systems, and Citrix application services.
- Developed and managed an integrated and secure customer support website using custom content management solutions for call tracking, software delivery, and knowledge base solutions through the software development life cycle.
Senior Systems Engineer¶
Datamaxx
Tallahassee, Florida
May 1999 - June 2000
- Designed and implemented enterprise document and image management software solutions.
- Coordinated and managed project teams to successfully deploy custom software and hardware at customer sites.
- Responsible for pre-sales and services, including proof-of-concepts, design, documentation, implementation, and integration.
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Customized solutions and applications for various vertical market organizations.
Notable Clients
- Florida State University
- St. Joe Company
- Citrix Systems, Inc.
- Frito-Lay
- Tropicana
Senior Network Engineer¶
The University of Georgia, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
Tifton, Georgia
National Environmentally Sound Production Agriculture Laboratory (NESPAL)
September 1998 - May 1999
- Deployed and managed a Microsoft Windows NT domain and workstation environment for precision agriculture research.
- Implemented remote access, application, web, mail, file and print services.
- Implemented maintenance, security, and storage retention procedures for university research data.
- Migrated network infrastructure to Cisco switching and routing foundations.
- Developed and designed content management systems and websites for university research.
Forest Ecology Researcher¶
The Jones Center at Ichauway
Newton, Georgia
June 1998 – September 1998
- Field sampling of Longleaf pine forest controlled-burn and canopy growth, data collection, and lab analysis preparation.
- Research data curation and GIS mapping.
Network Engineer¶
Sacred Heart University
Fairfield, Connecticut
April 1997 - May 1998
- Managed and monitored university campus LAN/WAN network infrastructure consisting of Windows NT servers/workstations, remote access, file, print and Microsoft Exchange mail servers for 5,000+ students, faculty and staff.
- Migrated customers to Microsoft Exchange from UNIX messaging platform and upgraded Windows NT systems.
- Deployment and management of Cisco switching and routing network infrastructure.
- Design and deployment of Neuroscience technology lab for the College of Arts and Sciences.
Systems Analyst¶
Sacred Heart University
Fairfield, Connecticut
August 1995 - April 1997
- Provided software and hardware technical support to a mobile computing program and university campus customers.
- Logged helpdesk requests, carried out fieldwork, repaired and serviced systems.
- Developed and maintained an intranet website to assist mobile computing customers with information and services.
Publications¶
Mastering VMware vSphere 6.7, Sybex, 2018
Contributing Author, Chapters 11, 12, and 14
Patents¶
Managing L4 Ports
US 20230021019 A1 · Issued Jan 19, 2023
Transforming ports (L4) from passive conduits of data into security aware code ("software defined") that have the ability to securely configure themselves so that applications and network traffic are actively secured.
Open Source Projects¶
Education¶
Bachelors of Science, Biological Sciences¶
Sacred Heart University
Fairfield, Connecticut
August 1995 - May 1998
Certification & Accreditation¶
- GitHub Certified, GitHub Foundations
- GitHub Certified, GitHub Actions
- GitHub Certified, GitHub CoPilot
- GitHub Certified, GitHub Advanced Security
- GitHub Certified, GitHub Administration
- GitLab Certified, Git Associate
- GitLab Certified, Project Management Associate
- GitLab Certified, CI/CD Associate
- HashiCorp Core Contributor 2025 (Terraform and Packer)
- HashiCorp Certified, Terraform Associate
- Microsoft Certified, Azure Fundamentals
- AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate
- AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
- VMware vExpert 2013-2025
- VMware Certified Professional, VMware Cloud Foundation Architect 2024
- VMware Certified Professional, VMware Cloud Foundation Administrator 2024
- VMware Certified Professional, VMware vSphere Foundation Administrator 2024
- VMware Certified Implementation Expert, Data Center Virtualization
- VMware Certified Implementation Expert, Network Virtualization
- American Red Cross Adult and Pediatric First Aid/CPR/AED
More on available Credly.
Awards¶
- VMware vExpert 2012 – 2025, VMware vExpert Profile
- Certification Subject Matter Expert - Data Center Virtualization 2021
- Certification Subject Matter Expert - VMware Cloud Foundation 2021
- Certification Subject Matter Expert - Cloud Management and Automation 2019
Technical Skills¶
| Amazon Web Services | HashiCorp Terraform | Microsoft Office 365 |
| Microsoft Azure | HashiCorp Packer | Microsoft Active Directory Services |
| VMware Cloud | HashiCorp Vault | Microsoft SQL Server |
| VMware vSphere | Linux (Ubuntu, Red Hat or variants) | Microsoft Windows Server |
| VMware Aria Suite | GitHub / GitLab | PowerShell and Bash Scripting |
| VMware Workspace ONE Access | Figma | Adobe Creative Suite |
| Agile Development | JIRA | Confluence |
Notable Presentations¶
VMworld US Top 10 Sessions:
- INF9083: Ask the vCenter Server Experts Panel (2016)
- INF4529: vSphere Certificate Management for Mere Mortals (2015)
- INF1522: Monitoring the Health, Performance and Efficiency of vSphere (2014)
Volunteer Experience¶
Assistant Scoutmaster and Advancement Coordinator¶
Scouts BSA Troop 114
Tallahassee, Florida
January 2019 - March 2023
Set Builder¶
Young Actors Theatre
Tallahassee, Florida
August 2021 – Present
Other Experience¶
Masters Rowing¶
Tallahassee Rowing Club
Tallahassee, Florida
Men's's 4+ and Mixed 8+, 2006 – 2008