GitLab All-Remote Model

GitLab, a software company that provides a platform for collaborative software development, was founded in 2011 by Dmitriy Zaporozhets and Sid Sijbrandij. From the beginning, it operated without a physical headquarters. By 2023, the company employed over two thousand people across more than sixty-five countries, making it one of the largest all-remote companies in the world.¹

GitLab published its internal operating manual as a publicly accessible handbook that exceeded two thousand pages by 2022. The handbook documents every process, from onboarding to performance reviews to how meetings are conducted. The company’s operating principle is that anything not written down does not exist as a policy.²

Communication defaults to asynchronous. Meetings require agendas published in advance. Decisions are documented in writing so that employees in different time zones can participate without being awake at the same hour.³

2,000+, GitLab employees across more than 65 countries, with no physical headquarters

In October 2021, GitLab went public on the NASDAQ at a valuation of roughly $11 billion, one of the largest IPOs by a fully remote company. The listing demonstrated that the model could produce a publicly traded company valued by institutional investors.⁴

GitLab’s guide to all-remote work, published openly on its website, has been used as a reference by organizations transitioning to remote work, including during the rapid shift that followed the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.⁵

Timeline

• 2011, GitLab is founded as a fully remote company with no physical headquarters.
• 2021, GitLab goes public on NASDAQ at a valuation of approximately $11 billion.

Endnotes

1. GitLab, "All-Remote," about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote.
2. GitLab, "The GitLab Handbook," about.gitlab.com/handbook.
3. Sid Sijbrandij, "The Remote Playbook," GitLab, 2020.
4. Erin Griffith, "GitLab, a Company With No Offices, Is Now Worth $11 Billion," The New York Times, October 14, 2021.
5. GitLab, "All-Remote."