Every year I read hundreds of careers websites. Most of them say the same thing in slightly different fonts. So when an employer value proposition (EVP) tells the truth clearly enough that the right people lean in and everyone else quietly steps aside, I want to stand up and applaud.
This list is that applause. It is the first in a Happydance series celebrating the best EVP examples by sector and market, and it starts with US tech, where the competition for talent is fierce and the temptation to sound like everyone else is stronger still.
This is a celebration, not a teardown. Every point of praise is tied to something you can read on the brands’ own careers pages today. I scored each EVP against the Happydance EVP grading framework, which grows out of Give & Get Employer Branding, the book I co-wrote, and Sell The Truth. As I wrote there, “A strong EVP doesn’t flatter. It filters.”
Each EVP is scored from 1 to 5 on eight criteria taken directly from Give & Get Employer Branding and Sell The Truth, for a total out of 40: the Give and Get, the whole truth (harsh realities named plainly), story proof (change and conflict, with the employee as hero), employee voice, distinctiveness, audience fit (does it help people answer “Do I have what it takes?”), alignment and proof. Ties are broken on the Give and Get, then the whole truth, then story proof. A give is what an employee “must be prepared to provide, commit, or sacrifice” and a get is what they “can expect in return”.
I only scored what is public. Every quote below was copied from the brand’s own pages on 30 October 2026, and each entry links to its source. A lower score on one criterion is a note about what a candidate can see, never a verdict on the culture.
1
GitLab
36/40
The EVP as published: “A place where anyone can thrive.” Three operating principles (Speed with Quality, Ownership Mindset, Customer Outcomes) built on six public CREDIT values.
GitLab tells the whole truth and lets you check it. The jobs page invites you to “explore the handbook to learn more about how we run the company, you can even make a merge request to suggest changes.” The remote guide then names the harsh reality most companies hide: “being part of an all-remote company isn’t for everyone.” That is a smart filter in plain sight.
The Give and Get
The Get is freedom: GitLab will “create space for team members across the globe to show up as their full selves and do the best work of their careers.” The Give is named in three operating principles: Speed with Quality, Ownership Mindset and Customer Outcomes. Listing the disadvantages of all-remote work beside the advantages lets you judge whether the benefits are worth the sacrifice.
The story proof
The values page goes where few dare, with sections titled “What to do if values aren’t being lived out” and “Playing politics is counter to GitLab values”. That is a vulnerability backed by the conviction to change, and it makes every other claim more credible.
What we can all learn
Say who it is not for, then show your working. Publishing the disadvantages is the strongest proof of the advantages.
How to get more from the careers website
Link the remote guide’s honest list of disadvantages, and a few team member stories, straight from each operating principle on the jobs page, so candidates meet the smart filter without digging.
The EVP as published: Four principles in the Netflix culture memo: The Dream Team, People Over Process, Uncomfortably Exciting, and Great and Always Better.
Netflix remains the purest smart filter in tech. The memo says it outright: “But Netflix is not for everyone, so please read on.” It repels the many to compel the few, and it answers the candidate’s real question, “Do I have what it takes?”, before anyone applies.
The Give and Get
The Give: “We aim only to have high performers at Netflix.” The Get: freedom and trust, in policies like “Our vacation policy is “take vacation”, and we actually do.” The metaphor makes the deal unforgettable: “It’s why we model ourselves on a professional sports team, not a family.”
The story proof
The memo is admirably honest about its own gaps: “While we don’t always live up to these principles, most people who join Netflix are pleasantly surprised by how great their colleagues are.” The careers pages carry fewer first-person stories than the leaders here, so story and employee voice score 3.
What we can all learn
Say who you are not for. The repelling effect is not a flaw. It is the filter.
How to get more from the careers website
Link each principle to a short first-person story of someone living it, and let job pages state the Give and Get of the role, so the deal is shown as well as described.
The EVP as published: “Where the bold go to grow.” Four Culture Commitments: Solve for the Customer; Be Bold. Learn Fast.; Align, Adapt & Go!; Deliver with HEART.
HubSpot is the best on this list at turning a Give and Get into stories. The Culture Code was “Read 5M+ times. Revised dozens of times.” and the careers website ties it to four commitments with real behavioural edges, such as “We choose courage over comfort.”
The Give and Get
The Get is clear: “Growth without limits”, remote-first flexibility and “A company that cares”. The Give is written as behaviours, not adjectives: “We move fast and we move together.”
The story proof
The Careers Blog is where HubSpot shines. Its Built Different story about Kaiya Salemy opens with a real Trigger: “There’s a particular kind of overwhelm that comes from having too much permission.” Kaiya says: “It almost reassured me that I wasn’t expected to ‘get it right’ from the get go.” Tension, insight and a visible Harvest, with the employee as the hero.
What we can all learn
Give every culture commitment a story with a struggle in it. That is when a Give and Get stops living as a statement and starts living as a story.
How to get more from the careers website
The careers website gives the Culture Commitments and the Culture Code pride of place, which makes the deal easy to find.
The EVP as published: “Develop the best education in the world and make it universally available.” Five handbook principles, including Take the Long View, Raise the Bar and Ship It!
Duolingo has one of the most distinctive EVPs in tech because it wrote its culture as lessons rather than aspirations. The Duolingo Handbook says it “captures our core principles through stories of wins, failures, and plenty of surprises along the way.” Admitting the failures is what makes the wins believable.
The Give and Get
The Get is a mission worth the effort: “Develop the best education in the world and make it universally available.” The Give is spelled out as behaviours: “Raise the Bar: To change how the world learns, we must do world-class work.”
The story proof
The careers page carries the CEO’s own posts, including his habit of using the product as a learner: “Every session, I file 1 to 5 bug reports.” The blog adds people-team voices on why “we invest heavily in belonging”.
What we can all learn
Write your principles as lessons you earned, failures included. Candidates believe scar tissue far more than slogans.
How to get more from the careers website
Bring a Handbook lesson, failures included, onto the careers and job pages, with the pace each role demands stated plainly, so people can answer “Do I have what it takes?” sooner.
The EVP as published: “Reimagine the way people come together.” Four values: Respect the Community, Take the Long View, Be Responsible, and Get Stuff Done.
Roblox treats its values as true behaviours rather than a poster. Its VP of Engineering, Claus Moberg, says on the careers page: “If you use our Roblox values as a decision-making algorithm, it’s very rare that you don’t know what to do.”
The Give and Get
The Get is impact early. Erica Snow writes: “Some people wait five years to ship a project to a hundred million users. At Roblox, that can happen in the first month.” The Give is named as a mindset: Roblox wants “people who are sharp, motivated, and ready to take ownership”, with “Get Stuff Done” and “Be Responsible” setting the bar.
The story proof
The early careers article tells a real story with a Harvest: an early career hire built a model to spot fake accounts, and it “doubled precision in catching alternate accounts”. An intern adds: “I like that I’m able to make an impact and work on things a normal junior SWE wouldn’t be able to do at other tech companies.”
What we can all learn
Show how your values help people decide, then show someone deciding.
How to get more from the careers website
Pair each value with a short story from a different team, and write job descriptions that name the ownership each role demands, so the Give and Get is visible where people apply.
NVIDIA has one of the most memorable true behaviours in tech: “The project is the boss”, a principle the careers page says applies even to the CEO. It tells you instantly what you will be asked to put first.
The Give and Get
The Get comes with rare proof: “Our ESPP is one of the best in the industry, delivering more than $300 million in value to our employees and interns last year alone.” The Give is implied: “You’ll solve some of the world’s hardest problems.” Naming one harsh reality beside the reward would help candidates ask: do I have what it takes to thrive here?
The story proof
NVIDIA Life is full of people as heroes. Validation engineer Sakeena Fiza says: “Validation engineers look in the shadows and shine a light into every corner.” The story names the tension honestly: “For Fiza, the pressure of the work is inseparable from the pleasure of it.”
What we can all learn
Give your culture a line people repeat, then back the promise with a number nobody can argue with.
How to get more from the careers website
Place a story like Sakeena Fiza’s beside the matching culture line, and let job descriptions name the pressure as well as the pleasure, so candidates can judge their fit.
The EVP as published: “We are lowering the world’s tolerance for bad experiences.” Culture pillars including “We are here to get it right, not be right.” and the TACOS values.
Qualtrics names its harsh reality with pride. “It takes grit, a disdain for convention, and obsessing over our customers.” And “We are here to get it right, not be right.” tells you how meetings feel before you have sat in one.
The Give and Get
The Give is honest about effort: grit, scrappiness and obsessing over customers. The Get is growth and fairness: “We bet on our people & watch them grow.” and “We recognize impact based on performance and results, not politics.” Naming the hard part first helps the right people opt in.
The story proof
Qualtrics Life carries deeply human stories, none more moving than Troy’s, about how, after years of donating to 5 For The Fight, “he experienced the impact of their cancer research first hand.”
What we can all learn
Wear your harsh realities like a badge of honour. Specific, slightly uncomfortable language is far more memorable than safe adjectives.
How to get more from the careers website
In our test the page took about 3 seconds to show first content and about 4.5 seconds to finish loading; a faster first view, plus Qualtrics Life stories linked from each pillar, would land the message sooner.
Microsoft has made growth mindset a genuine Give, not a perk: “Mastery is a journey, and failure is often a step along the way.” Naming failure as part of the deal is the whole truth at work.
The Give and Get
The Give is courage: “We celebrate the courage it takes to lean into uncertainty.” The Get is support and purpose, with real proof: “Microsoft matches employee donations dollar for dollar, up to $15,000 per person annually.”
The story proof
The page states that “Employees, their stories, and their truths are what power Microsoft” and links out to Microsoft Unlocked and the Code of Us stories. That storytelling lives a click away from the careers page, so story and employee voice score 3.
What we can all learn
Turn a belief into an expectation, then prove it. Specific numbers make a promise feel like a policy.
How to get more from the careers website
A clearer route, or conversational navigation, from each cultural attribute to a story of failure and recovery in the reader’s own job family would bring the proof closer.
The EVP as published: “The best place for ambitious people to learn and grow.” Three promises and values including “Drivers wanted” and “We’re 1% done”.
Klaviyo writes one of the clearest Give and Get statements in US tech, and leads with the harsh reality. The work “isn’t easy”, and “it’s not meant to be.” Then: “But if you thrive on challenge, the reward is well worth it: accelerated growth, real impact, and work that truly matters.”
The Give and Get
Textbook. The Give: “Klaviyo is an environment built for people who want ownership, thrive on feedback, and are motivated by meaningful challenges.” The Get: three explicit promises, plus “a fully paid sabbatical every five years.” Are the benefits worth the sacrifice? Plainly, yes.
The story proof
Today the careers page leans on photography and team spotlights rather than first-person stories with real tension, so story and employee voice score 2.
What we can all learn
Name the hard part first, then the reward. Candidates trust a deal that admits its price.
How to get more from the careers website
The careers website leads with the deal itself, so the Give and Get is the first thing a candidate reads.
The EVP as published: “Our values show how we work, learn, and win together.” Coupa Core Values: Drive Success for #AllOfUs, Build Tomorrow Together, Cultivate Belonging, Own Our Results.
Coupa hands the microphone to its people, which is exactly where Sell The Truth says the narrator belongs. Its stories hub is “Written by Coupanians. Inspired by Culture.”
The Give and Get
The Get is belonging and a voice: “A place where your ideas matter, your expertise counts, and your passion fuels our collective journey.” The Give is carried by “Own Our Results”. Pairing that value with one harsh reality, the honest detail that shows what it takes to thrive, not just survive, would make the exchange sharper and help people judge their own fit.
The story proof
Engineer Sai Sumanth Valluri’s story has real tension. Holding another offer, he asked his recruiter: “Could we complete the entire interview process in a single day?” Coupa did. Kristi Gay adds that “it feels great to show up as yourself”.
What we can all learn
Let employees write the stories, not just star in them. Your narrator is your people.
How to get more from the careers website
A careers website that puts people first: named Coupanians speak in their own words on the homepage, Coupa Stories is a click away, and pages such as Life in Dublin and Life in India show each location. We were proud to build it.
What we can all learn from the best EVPs in US tech
Side by side, these ten share five lessons.
1
Name the price as well as the prize. GitLab, Netflix and Klaviyo say what it takes, and who it is not for. That is the EVP as a smart filter: repel the many, compel the few.
2
Write values as true behaviours. Roblox calls its values a decision-making algorithm. Duolingo writes principles as lessons, failures included. Helping candidates see where they will thrive starts here. A value that helps someone decide is worth far more than one that decorates a wall.
3
Let your people tell it, struggle included. HubSpot, Coupa and NVIDIA prove their claims with first-person employee stories where the employee is the hero. As I wrote in Sell The Truth, “These are not testimonials. They are social proof at human scale.”
4
Show the harsh realities. GitLab publishes the disadvantages of all-remote work; Netflix admits it does not always live up to its principles. Honesty about tension makes everything else believable.
5
Back promises with proof. NVIDIA’s ESPP figure and Microsoft’s donation matching turn warm words into policy.
If you want to see how your own EVP measures up, run it through the free Employer Brand and EVP Grader on the Employer Brand Atlas, the Happydance community for employer brand people. And if your careers website is where the story falls down, a free Happydance careers website audit will show you where real stories would make the biggest difference.
Frequently asked questions
What is an EVP?
An employer value proposition (EVP) is the deal between an employer and its people. Give & Get Employer Branding frames it as a value exchange: what your people must be willing to give, in return for what they can get. The best EVPs help the right people recognise themselves and the wrong people opt out.
What makes a great EVP example?
It states the Give and the Get together, tells the whole truth, proves it with employee stories, sounds like nobody else and backs it with proof.
Which company has the best EVP in US tech in 2026?
In our 2026 review of US tech careers websites, GitLab scored highest (36 out of 40), ahead of Netflix and HubSpot (35 each), with Netflix second on our Give and Get tie-break.
How were these EVPs scored?
Each EVP was scored from 1 to 5 on eight criteria from the Happydance EVP grading framework, built on Give & Get Employer Branding and Sell The Truth, using only public content on the brands’ own sites.
How can I improve my own EVP?
State what you ask of people as clearly as what you offer, then prove each claim with a real employee story. The free EVP grader on the Employer Brand Atlas gives you a quick score.
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