If I'm reading right, it looks like a company can become a "recognised sponsor," which allows them to sponsor as many of their employees as they want for relocation, provided they meet salary requirements etc. It doesn't look like there is a government-side discretionary approval like the US green card or (at least in the Netherlands) a quota or lottery like the US H-1B. There's a background check but that's it.
Anecdata: when I worked at a US tech company, one of our teammates got transferred to the Netherlands because he couldn't get a visa renewal in time. I believe it's a common country to stash anyone who's having visa issues.
Canada is also popular, especially BC - it's where Amazon, Google, and Microsoft move people who couldn't get a H-1B renewal but want to keep them in the same time-zone. It's only a 2-hour drive from Seattle so having in-person meetings is still possible.
My understanding is that this goes back to Rotterdam being a free or open port, since the late Renaissance period. The Netherlands has been a proponent of free trade and what we'd call international citizenship for a very long time
Right, but I don't think GitLab can enforce the right to come to the Netherlands. Presumably if the Dutch security services have a reason to stop someone coming in there's nothing that GitLab can do about that.
Yes, that would be a better way to say it. When I wrote the header for https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/people-group/visas/#right-... years ago I was still processing that there is a human right to leave your country but that only works if there is another country that will have you, which isn't the case for the vast majority of people.
