Roman Denenberg
Team Manager, Compliance & Assurance Systems | Microsoft Cloud Operations + Innovation (Dec 9, 2025)
"She does more than deliver results, she reimagines processes, designs scalable solutions, optimizes operational efficiency, and enables teams to exceed ambitious goals."
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It is an absolute privilege to recommend Melissa Witte-Spencer for any opportunity in compliance, governance, risk, audit, data center operations, or program and product management. As a senior program leader and team manager overseeing various Compliance & Assurance programs and systems within the Cloud Operations + Innovation organization at Microsoft, the backbone infrastructure to Azure Cloud, I had the pleasure of managing Melissa as a Senior Technical Compliance Manager on my team. Throughout her tenure, she always demonstrated a rare combination of strategic vision, technical expertise, and transformative leadership that elevated every program she led.
Melissa is an exceptional professional whose contributions have had a profound and lasting impact on both team performance and organizational outcomes. She excels in program management, product development, stakeholder engagement, data-driven reporting, and driving transformation through AI and advanced technologies. She does more than deliver results, she reimagines processes, designs scalable solutions, optimizes operational efficiency, and enables teams to exceed ambitious goals. She approaches every challenge with creativity and rigor, not only managing programs but maturing and scaling them. Her innovative mindset consistently brings measurable improvements and strategic value across business and technical initiatives.
What truly sets Melissa apart is her leadership and influence. Melissa is a natural leader who fosters a culture of collaboration, accountability, and excellence, building trust effortlessly across diverse stakeholders and organizational functions. She navigates complex challenges with clarity and decisiveness, translating intricate business needs into actionable solutions while inspiring her colleagues to perform and achieve their best. Her dedication, insight, and consistent excellence make her a leader at every level.
Melissa's combination of expertise, leadership, and drive for innovation makes her an extraordinary asset to any organization, team, or project. She is an outstanding individual and team performer whose impact resonates throughout an organization. I recommend her wholeheartedly and without reservation, any company would be extremely fortunate to have her.
Contact: rodenenb@microsoft.com | 571-246-1622
"Melissa's end-to-end ownership of the PXR program is demonstrated by her successful processing of 122 requests in FY25 to date, with a projected total of 155 by year-end representing an anticipated 46% year-over-year growth."
Roman Denenberg
Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa's leadership in evolving the Policy Exception PXR program, from SOP modernization to workflow optimization, has directly improved risk management and operational efficiency."
Roman Denenberg
Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa's data-driven storytelling through Power BI and her support in QBRs have been incredibly impactful. The way she distilled complex insights, using advanced tools like DAX and Co-Pilot, into actionable trends shows her dedication."
Roman Denenberg
Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa consistently demonstrates a collaborative, solution-oriented approach. She partners effectively with engineering, compliance, and assurance teams, and her ownership of process improvements, documentation quality, and training initiatives reflects her strong leadership."
Roman Denenberg
Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa's contributions during this fiscal year have been extremely impactful through her leadership in compliance tooling, deep technical understanding, process innovation, and cross-functional collaboration."
Roman Denenberg
Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"I'd like to acknowledge the exceptional work Melissa has put in over the last six months. Her efforts in exploring Microsoft Forms, assisting colleagues, and actively participating in Control Monitoring Audit UAT Working Sessions have been impactful and positively influenced our team and stakeholders."
Ron Munro
Sr. Director | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa does not shy away from learning new technologies and how to employ them, this was evident when she utilized Co-Pilot to take a first pass draft at requirements for a replacement to the EGRC workflows."
Brian Nowak
Sr. Compliance Manager | Microsoft (2025)
"Melissa is really good at putting the CRSM data in a format and location that is able to be consumed by all interested stakeholders. She actively maintains the ROB in the compliance SharePoint site along with other PowerBI metrics that make gaining control status easy."
Brian Nowak
Sr. Compliance Manager | Microsoft
"Melissa embraced several new opportunities to collaborate for impact. Her Growth Mindset has been visible in the core business efforts she has leaned in to and through the numerous Compliance and Assurance related trainings and certifications she has pursued."
Tamara McBride
Manager | Microsoft
"As of October, Melissa has transitioned to the Compliance team to own the Controls Monitoring Framework program. Over the past 2 months I have seen Melissa quickly ramp up to take ownership of this program with limited training/resources available to her. Melissa is well on her way to becoming an expert in this space."
Ann Morrell
Sr. Director | Microsoft
"Your continued leadership and management of the Policy Exception process. This program has been running smoothly for a long time, and you continue to find opportunities to improve and refine it. I especially appreciate the reporting capabilities we have now."
Matt Smith
Director DBD Security | Microsoft
"Melissa consistently demonstrates the One Microsoft culture, fostering cross-functional collaboration, pulling in appropriate teams to solve issues as they arise. She has been pivotal in accomplishing some of the improvements to the tooling that my team has requested."
Dave Small
Principal Tech Excellence | Microsoft
"The COI EGRC prioritization tracker is super helpful to view the many different COI requests and keep us aligned to top priorities."
Alyssa
DSRE | Microsoft
"Melissa, you have made a significant positive impact to the Asset Management team, Global Foundation Services, and Microsoft during FY13 by applying your deep subject matter expertise to the Get Clean financial reconciliation project. Your efforts were appreciated, and recognized cross-group by Finance as exceptional."
Michael Heier
Manager | Microsoft (FY13)
"You are considered to be approachable, focused, persistent, and holding a wealth of knowledge and subject matter expertise. You take ownership and demonstrate passion for solving problems."
Michael Heier
Manager | Microsoft
"I've appreciated your tremendous knowledge and assistance in documenting our Asset Management status for AMALFI, ALF, and SAP Recon."
Jeff Jones
Peer | Microsoft
"Thanks for your help in decipher our Azure Blade billing issues. You've helped tremendously to raise my understanding of our data."
Doug Keith
Peer | Microsoft
"She won the GFS TOP nomination for Leadership for her efforts in driving the GFS-OSD engagement. Her attention to detail and thorough organization of the monthly GFS-OSD engagement meeting was unparalleled by her peers and the BGE team. Her personal growth from analyst to Business Group advocate has been transformational."
Sean Wright
Manager | Microsoft (FY11)
"Melissa has built up good relationships with the planners. They trust her and go to her with questions and concerns. She has set a rhythm that makes it easy for people to understand when planning is happening."
Latosha Smith
Manager | Microsoft
"This year was transformational for you Melissa. Your passion, your determined focus on quality and your drive for results matched powerfully with your SKU data quality charter. You have established yourself with colleagues and managers across GFS as a subject matter expert who is flexible and able to adjust to deliver results for the business."
Tom Harpel
Manager | Microsoft (FY12)
"Certain words—passion, steady progress, partnering, engaged, collaborative, instrumental, leader—appear more than once across the body of feedback, and illustrate well the respect and credibility you have earned with your work."
Tom Harpel
Manager | Microsoft (FY12)
"Melissa has been a valuable business partner whenever we need assistance from our end. She is responsive to our inquiries and she does our best to partner with us in an efficient way. Of all the GFS horizontal programs, Melissa's onboarding process was the most helpful and comprehensive."
Peer Feedback
Microsoft (FY09)
