Sid Sijbrandij
Co-founder & Executive Chair, GitLab Inc.. On 3 shows, 5 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
founderexecutiveinvestor@sytses ↗LinkedIn ↗sytse.com ↗
Sijbrandij co-founded GitLab in 2012, pioneering an all-remote workforce and open-core model to take the DevSecOps platform public on Nasdaq in 2021 before transitioning from CEO to Executive Chair in 2024. Beyond GitLab, he established Open Core Ventures to back open-source founders and launched the AI coding platform Kilo Code.
3shows
5appearances
99statements
30resolved
25supported
3contradicted
83%fully supported
25said about them ↓ Everything Sid Sijbrandij said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Sid Sijbrandij: Remote work scales better as a company grows larger
“In fact, remote works better the bigger you are. Like, if you're seven people, it's probably better to be in a room together, if that's practical. If you're 1500 people, what's the advantage? You can't be in the same room anymore. You can hardly be in the same…”
Sid Sijbrandij: Less than 10% of workers return when offices reopen
“When companies open back their offices, less than 10% of the people go back. They are longing for that informal communication.”
Sid Sijbrandij: Top remote talent at hybrid companies will leave for all-remote
“The hybrid that doesn't work is some people are at the office and some people are remote. We think the most talented people in those companies that work remote will leave for a company that's all remote because they want to be on the same level as everybody el…”
Sid Sijbrandij: GitLab strictly bans presentations during internal company meetings
“At GitLab, you're not allowed to present in meetings.”
Sid Sijbrandij: DIY DevOps with custom tool integrations is dead
“That DIY DevOps is dead. Like the area of selecting 10 best in class solutions for DevOps and then having custom integrations between them that you maintain that is no longer working. It's both not leading to a good outcome and it's way too much effort.”
Sijbrandij: Buyer-based open core best aligns revenue with community contributions
“So we ended up charging based on the buyer. For features that are used by an individual contributor, we put them in the open source code base. For features that are the focus of an executive, we put them in the highest paid version. That works really well beca…”
Sijbrandij: Public Roadmaps Net Positive Because Building Customer Needs Trumps Secrecy
“But all in all, it's been a very positive thing for us because the most important thing about your roadmap is not that it's a secret, but that it's correct that you're making the stuff that customers want.”
Sijbrandij: Releasing incomplete software with low shame enables community product flywheels
“In a very small iteration, so sometimes the stuff we release, we have a low level of shame about them. They're not complete, and we know it, but it allows people from the community to come in and contribute to it, and by contributing to it, they make it accept…”
Sijbrandij: Operating an all-remote company is easier than managing a hybrid workplace
“I think being all remote is a lot easier than being hybrid. Where part of your people are co-located and part are not.”
Sid Sijbrandij: Returning completely to in-office work is a pipe dream
“Also, I think it's a pipe dream that we're going to go back to completely being in the office. Some people are going to be remote. So focus more time on making that work.”
Sid Sijbrandij: Laziness is often a symptom of perfectionism, not underperformance
“I think laziness is almost a shortcut. That's too easy. Like what's going on in their life. And that might not be an excuse to do it, but. I think most of the times when I'm lazy, it's because I have two of a high bar for the output and the end result, and I p…”
Sid Sijbrandij: Pitch a specific 10-minute problem instead of generic mentorship
“I think what's really, what I see sometimes is that people reach out and ask whether you want to be their mentor. And I think that's Unlikely to be a yes for me, but I think also from other people. I think you want to kind of, you want to start small, iterate …”
Sid Sijbrandij: Board members should only ask questions, not direct operations
“As a board member, you should really only be asking questions and getting informed and”
Sid Sijbrandij tested Series B investors with mock board strategy discussions
“And what I did, for example, in our B round, I kind of had Calling it a mock board meeting is too far, but I went through our strategy and kind of waited for them to kind of wait it. We discussed and asked them to add value and then what you get back, how that…”
Sijbrandij: GitLab commits to never moving free features into paid tiers
“Some specific promises that we make are that we won't move features from free code into a paid tier. We won't artificially limit or delay features for the free tier. For example, in our code base, we're not putting a limit on repositories, user size, or perfor…”
Sijbrandij: Open-source companies should avoid heavily recruiting from their own community
“Over time, you should focus your active recruiting efforts elsewhere to avoid depleting your wider community.”
Startups should always maintain infinite runway without future funding
“Always make sure that you can get back to cash flow break, even with the cash you have in the bank. Never depend on a future fundraise.”
Sijbrandij: Majority of GitLab revenue comes from self-hosted deployments
“The majority of our revenue is still coming from self-hosted.”
Sijbrandij: Companies suffer more from internal strategy secrecy than competitor awareness
“Yeah, I think a lot of companies are kind of hesitant to articulate and disseminate their strategy to make it public or to even share it within the company. And there's benefits from your competitors not knowing your strategy, but I've seen a lot more companie…”
Sijbrandij: GitLab pays remote employees location-based rates, not uniform global salaries
“We pay people differently. We have a blog post about it, why we pay people local rates.”
Sid Sijbrandij: Open-source projects should monetize when paying buyers request features
“So if the people asking for features are people that can pay for them, it's probably good to start monetizing.”
Sid Sijbrandij: Software shipping should fix deadlines and reduce feature scope
“We always say that time is fixed, and then the scope is variable, so great, if you have a hard time meeting the deadline, just cut down the scope, do less, and I think that's been very great, so just stick to your deadlines.”
The other half of the tape: Sid Sijbrandij's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 23 times in 13 episodes across the shows. 2 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Nathan Latka 12Mike Preuss 4Tristan Handy 2Harry Stebbings 2Tom Hulme 1Matt Mullenweg 1Jason Lemkin 1
Statements about Sid Sijbrandij, by other people (2)
Latka: GitLab raised $100M one month after denying fundraising
“And sure enough, a month after I do the interview, you know, GitLab raised a hundred million dollars.”
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
Top Founders 17
20VC 6
2026 1 mention in 1 episode
2024 1 mention in 1 episode
2022 10 mentions in 4 episodes 3 per episode
- DevOps Tool Fig Raised $2.2m in 2020, Now Approaching 100k MAU's, Whats Next?
- Tristan Handy: Why The CEO Should Make As Few Decisions As Possible | 20VC #937 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
- Full Stack Permissions as a Service Launches, $6m in Fresh Capital to Buy Time
- This Developer Tool Doubled To $240k ARR And Raised at a $14m Post Money Valuation
- every mention in 2022, scene by scene →
2021 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
2020 4 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
- 20VC: Ashton Kutcher on Early Lessons From Investing in Airbnb and Spotify, Why VC Ownership Requirements Are Becoming More and More Egregious & What Being Good At Product Truly Means
- Trainual Hits $3m ARR, 3x YoY Helping 2500 Customers Document Key Processes
- 1667 Top Tech Journalist Predicts We'll All Be Unemployed, Blockchain Takeover, Less Taxes!
- every mention in 2020, scene by scene →
2019 4 mentions in 1 episode
2018 1 mention in 1 episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Sid's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20VCLEDGER | Co-founder & Executive Chair, GitLab Inc. | 2 | 46 | 73% 11/15 | full record on 20VC → |
| TOP FOUNDERSLEDGER | Co-founder & Executive Chair, GitLab Inc. | 2 | 38 | 89% 8/9 | full record on Top Founders → |
 SAASTRLEDGER | Co-founder & Executive Chair, GitLab Inc. | 1 | 15 | 100% 6/6 | full record on the Official SaaStr Podcast → |