- Gapstars named in Topx 10 IT/ITes Workplaces in Sri Lanka, Top 10 Places to Work for Millennials, and awarded as a Great Place to Work for the fifth consecutive year.
Gapstars – a B2B service provider helping innovative Dutch software companies grow rapidly with high-performing agile offshore development teams in Sri Lanka, was recently recognized as one of the ‘Top 10 IT/ITes Workplaces in Sri Lanka’, as well as a Great Place to Work for the fifth consecutive year by Great Place to Work® Sri Lanka!
The list which is released annually celebrates organisations that have differentiated themselves by creating a great place to work for employees across the board.
From its earliest days, Gapstars has invested in several initiatives towards the personal and professional development of its employees. These were the foundations upon which it has built its culture. Focus of the company’s ethos remains on the well-being of its employees at all levels, by giving them a voice and offering them opportunities to grow.
Bridging the gap between innovative scale-ups in The Netherlands and agile software development teams in Colombo, the company continues to facilitate numerous visits for its Sri Lankan team members to its client headquarters in Amsterdam. For the employees of Gapstars, such visits help them better engage with clients and gain a deeper understanding of their business, expanding their personal networks and knowledge of the global business domain, setting a clear path of career development for its employees via the well-equipped Gapstars Academy.
The Gapstars Academy is dedicated to creating custom programmes for each employee to develop their core technology, professional and soft skills. The academy focuses on upskilling, as well as providing employees opportunities for bettering their personal branding, personal finance and business communication; whilst also supporting staff through their technical qualifications – facilitating talks and forums to engage with experts, to further develop their technical skills.
Gapstars continually invest in the growth and empowerment of their employees living by the belief that ‘while good IT professionals understand technology, great IT professionals understand how it can be utilised to solve challenges and enable their clients to succeed’.
Commenting on the recent GPTW awards, Gapstars Pvt Ltd, CEO – Hugo Hemmen, stated: “At Gapstars, ‘Our People’ always come first. Whether it is great technical expertise, timely delivery or simply the assurance that comes from a trusted developer relationship, in the end it is our people who make the difference. From our inception, the culture embedded in our value system, ‘Growth’, ‘Impact’ and ‘Family’, have enabled an environment for our people to bring in the best version of themselves and flourish. Our shared passion for excellence, the need for creating a bigger impact within Gapstars, as well as in the IT community, and treating one another as part of one big family have propelled us to reach greater heights in the industry both locally and globally. We are committed to cooperating fully in driving continuous improvement in our ‘people practices’. The Great Place to Work certification has been a key milestone to do just that!”
At present 93% of the Gapstars team are millennials, with approximately 48% of the Gapstars support and growth teams represented by females.
In addition, Gapstars has become renowned for its progressive human resources practices and strong focus on providing equal opportunities for members who identify as female; building a corporate culture celebrating hard work with a work-life balance, promoting the latter through gym, badminton and cricket club memberships. With the current economic crisis at hand, all members have confidential access to in-house counselors and mental health services, and receive salaries pegged to the Euro.
Gapstars in the Netherlands was founded in 2015 and is currently under the leadership of its CEO – Hugo Hemmen, and Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer – David Bijker. The international company provides software development services for start-ups and scale-ups based in the Netherlands. As a company that is growing rapidly, Gapstars has a workforce of 180+ employees based in Colombo and seeks to expand the team to 300+ engineers by the end of 2023.
