EPAM Vietnam is a 2022 certified Great Place to Work, a Best Technology Workplace and the #2 Best Workplace in Vietnam

Over the past years, Vietnam has been fast emerging as an IT hub, which attracted many software development service providers of all sizes to the region. In this highly competitive environment, companies that that have their best employees’ interest at heart are more successful at hiring top talent and building long-standing relationships as exemplified by EPAM, a leading digital transformation services and product engineering firm. Having opened a delivery center in Vietnam in 2019, EPAM has grown 5x in three years, been certified as Great Place to Work® and listed as the Best Technology Workplace in Vietnam and #2 overall in the top 10 companies on the 2022 list of Vietnam Best Workplaces™.

Olesia Kyrylchuk, Senior Director & Head of People at EPAM APAC: “When we enrolled in Great Place to Work certification, we wanted to know how we are doing against industry leaders and get objective insights into what can be improved. We were confident in making the list but did not expect to leave behind eight companies and become second best workplace in Vietnam! This award is important to us as it demonstrates that EPAM is committed to building scalable teams where people are satisfied in the work they do.”

EPAMers in Vietnam can be described in three words, they are enthusiastic, open, and ready-to-go. The corporate culture at EPAM Vietnam is characterized by a sense of community and camaraderie that withstood the test of Covid restrictions. Even though the company introduced a hybrid work mode, many employees still arrange to come to the office on certain days to meet with colleagues. In terms of skillsets, the team unites Java Engineers (Microservices), Manual/Automated QA Engineers, Frontend/Backend JavaScript Engineers, Cloud & DevOps Engineers, Business Analysts as well as Infrastructure Engineers and Project Managers. Together they work on projects for domestic and international clients across many industries: Financial Services, Retail & Distribution, Automotive & Manufacturing, etc.

The company has an ambitious goal to create 3,000 jobs in Vietnam in the following 5 years and become one of the biggest development centers in the country. With this in mind, EPAM has started to plan by partnering with universities, setting up useful community connections, raising brand awareness, and building a second level of seniors and team leads that are experienced with influencing, coaching and mentoring. While the office is located in Ho Chi Minh, the company hires remotely and has EPAMers all over Vietnam. EPAM is planning to open a second office in Hanoi in 2022.

EPAM Vietnam started in 2019 with an acquisition of a startup and set out to grow from 40 to 200 people by 2022. Such rapid growth brought about a few changes to operational processes that had to happen fast. For instance, exposure to international projects required the management to establish strong mature development processes, implement automation approaches, and learn to deal with project escalations. To achieve this, employees have been encouraged to act as seniors by taking on challenging tasks, making mistakes, and learning from them. All of these could not have happened without the knowledge and support of 61,600 global colleagues in 45+ countries. At EPAM people act globally and think beyond their local offices.

As the company has grown, it combined flexibility and fast decision-making of a startup with the stability of work and mature processes. Seeing every challenge as an opportunity, EPAM Vietnam developed communities where employees may interact with different people and experiment with skills in a way that is fun. The need to drive organizational development led to the appearance of Emerging Leaders Community that aims to provide a safe space for employees to come up with innovative ideas and take them upon themselves. There is also an Events Committee responsible for planning and executing different activities from informal gatherings to CSR initiatives. Those interested in technical matters can join Vietnam Engineering Community that promotes knowledge sharing via internal and external tech talks.

James Turner, Country Head at EPAM Vietnam: “Vietnam as a country itself has an immense potential. It is at the highest levels in terms of education and positive demographics which, combined with a strong management team, gives us all the right ingredients to be one of the top 5 delivery centers in the future. Our inclusion to the Vietnam Best Workplaces list where EPAM, in fact, ranked as the top IT company out of 6 tech firms, is an important milestone.”

EPAM provides employees with multiple opportunities for learning and development, clear career paths, above market compensation and many more. However, its offering goes beyond a standard benefit package. To create an environment that favors the wellbeing of employees, the company has programs that give people different experiences from their day-to-day projects. Employees can attend educational and sports events or join one of the CSR initiatives such as beach cleanup, tree planting, or flood relief activities. One of the company’s biggest initiatives is building technical skills on the labor market via a university program called Emerging Engineers Academy. Since 2021, EPAMers have dedicated a lot of efforts to working with fresh university graduates who want to accelerate their career in tech. You may learn the details here.

While community is important, the company values the individual and has several initiatives in place to make everyone feel safe and appreciated. For example, there is a quarterly Recognition Program that encourages employees to acknowledge accomplishments of their colleagues by exchanging corporate Heroes badges. During a rigorous COVID lockdown in Vietnam, EPAM sent care packages to employees and added remote medicine to the corporate insurance coverage. In times of the Ukrainian conflict, the company demonstrates a lot of personal involvement towards employees who arrive in Vietnam as part of the Relocation Program.

To explore career opportunities at EPAM Vietnam, visit the career page.

This article was originally published here.