With Its Medellín Expansion, TaskUs Is Finding It Easy to Embrace the Paisa Culture of Hospitality and Kindness
This summer, US outsourcing company TaskUs (NASDAQ: TASK) launched its second office in Colombia. After getting its start in the western city of Cali, the firm chose Medellín for its second location and sees itself raising its headcount up to around 500 people in the near future.
For now, the Medellín office is still in its early days as it ramps up its capability to provide BPO, digital services, and customer experience solutions from Colombia’s second city. So Loren Moss, executive editor of Finance Colombia, took this opportunity to sit down with Pablo Gonzalez to hear more about the expansion. As vice president of operations at TaskUs, he is heading up the new location, named The Gallery, and watching it grow more vibrant by the day as they continue integrating their culture with the local, unmistakable paisa energy that characterizes the region.
While scaling the business and landing the right clients remains job one, Gonzalez explains below how important it has been to make sure TaskUs is staying true to its mission of putting people first, treating its employees right, and becoming a valuable member of the Medellín community.

Pablo Gonzalez, vice president of operations at TaskUs. (Credit: TaskUs)
Loren Moss: Hello Pablo, how are you?
Pablo Gonzalez: I’m doing great, how about you?
Loren Moss: Wonderful, thank you so much for joining. And congratulations on your expansion into Medellín. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about that? TaskUs, of course, is an international outsourcing company based in the United States, and you guys operate in different countries. You guys started in Cali — when it comes to Colombia at least — and now you are opening a facility in Medellín, is that correct?
Pablo Gonzalez: That is correct, that is correct.
Loren Moss: Wonderful. How did you decide on, first, Colombia? And, after Cali, why did you decide to make Medellín your expansion?
Pablo Gonzalez: So, Colombia makes a lot of sense. I think, you know, it’s a very good place to outsource, especially for clients in the US. It’s very, very close when it comes to English. Feedback from clients is that the English that we can get out of Colombia resonates a lot with US customer. It’s kind of a neutral accent, so it does resonate a lot with customers in the US who are looking to outsource to Latin America.
Colombia just kind of makes sense. It has a good economic outlook, the English is fine, and the talent is also there. So it makes a lot of sense. There are a lot of components that make sense for US clients to look for outsourcing operations out of Colombia.
Then, when you look into Colombia, I think there are two main reasons why TaskUs looked at Medellín. I think the first one is that, basically, Medellín is the second largest city. When you look at Colombia, it has a lot of talent and it’s very well known as a city of innovation. So the expansion to Medellín basically represents a continuation of the mission — to serve and help our customers — whether that is existing logos or new logos.
For the city, this means more talent, more opportunities, more development, and more social contributions. So Medellín kind of makes sense because of that. And when you look deeper into Medellín, it’s not only like its numbers. When you deep dive into the culture itself, “paisas” — that’s what we call people from Medellín — are known for their culture of hospitality and kindness. They are very into service — it comes naturally to them — so this blends naturally with the TaskUs culture.
Basically those are the two main reasons why TaskUs looked at Colombia to continue its growth. In Medellín, we have an opportunity to continue expanding the footprint and continue with that mission of serving our customers.
Loren Moss: Tell me about your new location in Medellín. Where are you located? And what kind of facility are you opening?
Pablo Gonzalez: Right. So, our facility in Medellín is called “The Gallery.” If you are familiar with TaskUs, you know that basically each of our sites has a unique type of brand or theme, right? The one in Cali, which is the first site that we opened in Colombia, its name is “The Arena.” And the reason why it’s The Arena is because Cali lives a sports culture very passionately. The theme of that particular site is sports, and it has conference rooms that look a lot like the football stadium from Cali.
When you look at Medellín, the reason why it’s named The Gallery, is because people from Medellín live art very passionately. Our theme is inspired by all the street art and graffiti that takes place in the Medellín culture. So that’s basically the theme for building.
We are in a very central spot, which is at Ruta N — very close to public transportation, bus stations, metro stations, very close to universities. For us, it’s a very strategic location, not only because of being central to each location but its surroundings as well.
Loren Moss: Right. Ruta N is right across the street from Universidad de Antioquia, right?
Pablo Gonzalez: That is correct. You seem to navigate yourself in Medellín very well!
Loren Moss: Me defiendo [I manage]. So, what kind of clients are you serving out of your new Medellín location? What types of companies — like consumer packaged goods or technical support — or what kind of work are you doing out of the facility?
Pablo Gonzalez: So, currently, t’s a very new site — it’s brand new — and we started operations with a client from the healthcare sector. However, we are in conversations with several clients from different types of industries like technology and financial services. So it’s a location that when clients know it’s available, it definitely takes their interest in knowing more. We have had several clients visiting us already.
Pablo Gonzalez says potential clients “get very excited because it’s not only what TaskUs can do out of a city — but also how the culture of the city blends with the culture for that client. I think it’s a perfect combination.”
When they hear about Medellín, they know everything that takes place here — the innovation that the city is known for, all of the sports, the arts, gastronomy, and everything that is within the city. They get very excited because it’s not only what TaskUs can do out of a city — but also how the culture of the city blends with the culture for that client.
I think it’s a perfect combination. It’s a city that, as I was mentioning at the beginning, is very well-known for its passion, its service, its innovation. At the same time, if you combine that with what TaskUs can do globally, I think it’s a perfect mix — or a perfect recipe — for good customer service. When clients hear that we are here they get very excited about it. So it has definitely awakened the interest of several existing and new logos.
Loren Moss: That’s great. I think that one of the other benefits is that Medellín is a city that clients love to visit. I found that, lots of times, you’ll find that clients come here from other countries, whether it’s Europe or North America, and they are down here on business. Then, the next thing, you see the client, and I’m like, “Do we have a meeting?” And it’s like “No, I just wanted to come back!” It’s such a tourist-welcoming city that people like to come down here and look for any reason that they can to visit Medellín. I think that’s a good part of it.
So, tell me about the facility. Ruta N is a well-known business incubator, and it’s a great place for everything from entrepreneurs and startups to established global businesses. If you look back, there used to be some other global IT companies that made it their regional home. Why did you guys pick Ruta N? Then, also, tell me about your facility: what’s your capacity there and what are your capabilities and why did you decide to go into Ruta N?
Pablo Gonzalez: Let me start by telling you that our offices are designed to stimulate, inspire, and basically embolden the mind of our teammates. One of our cultural values within TaskUs is, “Work hard, have fun.” There’s a very good mix when you look at any of our sites.
In Medellín, it’s not any different. They are inspired. When you come into work you are happy to be there, but when you have your breaks and you are out of your shifts, there’s also plenty of activities within the site, to combine both of these things and actually live our culture. For us, it’s very nice to have this capability within the office, and it’s something that resonates a lot with our people. It’s our culture and our values, which is “Work hard, have fun.”
With Ruta N, it’s not only because of its location — but when we started, Ruta N also seemed like the right partner to start in a brand new city. They have a lot of contacts. They also, as you said yourself, are very glad to help you find talent and to connect you with different entities. It’s the right business partner to get into a new city. For us, it was a good match to start our operations in Medellín in that facility but also count with that partner.
“With Ruta N, it’s not only because of its location … It’s the right business partner to get into a new city. For us, it was a good match to start our operations in Medellín.”
– Pable Gonzalez of TaskUs
As I was telling you, our site is brand new, and currently our capacity to basically do business immediately is more than 200, but we are quickly adding more stations so we have the capability to add more seats very, very fast, in case that’s a client requirement. We want to be more than 500 stations in Colombia, in Medellín. But again, since we just started, this is what we have so far. But we plan to have more seats in the future, and how fast that goes basically depends on how fast clients want to do business with us in Medellín.
Loren Moss: By the way, I also want to congratulate you on participating in La Feria de las Flores. That’s something that you don’t normally see outsourcing companies do, but that’s such a big part of Medellín culture. So, second to last question: Tell me a little bit about how that came to happen.
For those people who don’t know, Colombia is one of the biggest flower exporters in the world, and a lot of those flowers come from the Medellín part of Colombia, Antioquia. When you fly to the airport and you are coming down for landing, you are gonna see greenhouses all around you. And those greenhouses, almost all of them are growing flowers. So every year they have a flower fair. That’s not something where you necessarily go to recruit talent or anything like that! But it’s kind of a surprising thing, to see that TaskUs was a part of the Feria de las Flores this year. Tell me about the inspiration behind that, and how you guys linked up with such an iconic paisa event.
Pablo Gonzalez: For us was an honor and a pleasure to be part of the festival. We like to merge with the culture and give back to the community, so it makes sense to us to be part of Feria de las Flores this year.
Fun fact: We actually had our senior vice president in Medellín during the weekend we went to Santa Elena and visited the “silletero” — the finca, or the farm, where they do these things — and we had our senior vice president also helping build the flower arrangements.
Loren Moss: Wow!
Pablo Gonzalez: It’s just amazing to be part of the culture and integrate with the culture. I truly believe, and TaskUs believes, that we have a lot of good things that we have learned through experience and by adding very senior people that have been doing BPO for so long.
I really think that you combine everything good that TaskUs has with all the good things that Medellín and its people can give — you combine those two cultures — and excellent product comes out of it. It’s a recipe for great service.
For us, it was just a pleasure to be there since the creation, understand the culture, understand the traditions, be there with the people, and not only come here to do business but also to give back to the communities — to the silletero families — to understand why all this is taking place. For us, as a company, and for me, leading the Medellín operation, it was, more than anything, a pleasure to be part of it. It was an amazing experience.

TaskUs participated in this year’s Feria de las Flores flower extravaganza, the most important and vibrant festival in Medellín. (Photo credit: TaskUs)
Loren Moss: Wow, that’s really great. For those people who don’t know, there’s a big parade of flowers that they do every year in Medellín. It’s really something that’s worth seeing. It’s worth visiting if you’ve never seen it. And the silletero is the person who carries the big thing — sometimes they weigh 200 pounds, 100 kilograms — on his or her back, and marches with this huge, heavy flower display on their back through the annual parade. It’s a labor of love. The people who do it are really honored to do it. It’s not like they go out and find some guy sitting around, but it’s really something that the people take very seriously. So that’s what that is.
My last question for you — and I want to thank you for being so generous with your time: You’ve talked about why TaskUs chose Medellín — and we’ve also in the past talked about why TaskUs chose Cali and why TaskUs chose Colombia — but let me ask you about TaskUs. Why do companies choose TaskUs? Because there are a lot of outsourcing companies — there are a lot of good outsourcing companies, and different ones have different niches and different specialties — but being one of the major companies, a multinational company, what makes TaskUs special? What makes TaskUs special not just for the employee, but for the clients that you serve? And why do those clients come to TaskUs and you guys keep growing? Why is that?
Pablo Gonzalez: I think mainly it’s because of the culture, right? The company truly believes in people first. And you see that not only when you walk into the site and you see the facilities and the amenities there. They are not generic. They are not pretty and that’s it. It takes into account what people want. It takes into account what people need.
It’s not only that. I think the benefits that we offer are definitely above industry standards by far. Something we have is a prepaid medical coverage, which is like a premium medical insurance, dental plans, and life insurance. And not only for executives, which is what you normally see, but for every single employee that we have. They have access to all of the benefits that are above industry standards. Some of these benefits are also available for their families. It’s not only our teammates, but how can we take care of their families as well.
“I’m very happy to be part of an organization that thinks so holistically about their people and that truly, truly lives their people-first culture.”
– Pablo Gonzalez of TaskUs
Beyond that, I think I’ve seen some really amazing things. As we understand more about business and about people’s needs, I think these benefits that I’m about to mention are very, very important and they mean a lot to me.
We have very robust wellness and resiliency programs that are absolutely free. So, if people feel that they need life coaching or they need to talk to a psychologist — or whatever — they can have that for free onsite. Now, with mental health, we are talking more openly about it and people are starting to get awareness of how important it is to not only take care of the body but also the mind.
Having benefits like these, to me, means a lot — taking care of how people feel and how they manage crises. Whether it’s because of work, whether it’s personal, for us, it’s no different. We take care of our employees regardless.
Those benefits I think resonate a lot with employees and potential candidates, and those are things that are not very common to find in the industry. I think those are some of the main things why it resonates with paisas and TaskUs in Medellín.
Loren Moss: You mentioned prepaid medical. It’s a big deal here in Colombia. Most companies, by law, have to provide EPS, which is kind of like the government-mandated basic plan. But people don’t realize that the private medicine plan that you guys offer usually costs more than half of what a basic salary is here. So, it’s really a luxury. It’s something that the average Colombian doesn’t have. For somebody to be able to work in a contact center and get that luxury plan that’s usually kind of reserved for — like we say in Colombia, ‘Estrato 6’ [high-income earners] — the top 10%, it’s a heck of a perk. That’s a really amazing benefit that you guys offer.
You talked about the wellness, you talked about being able to provide. Back in the United States, we would call that an employee assistance program. That’s really innovative. We don’t see that here. And one of the things I think that it seems that the philosophy is that the company is saying: we want to offer high-level benefits globally — not just comply with whatever the law says, but to do what we think is right, way above and beyond that. That’s really impressive. I’ve seen that having covered TaskUs in different countries and even here in Colombia in different cities. It seems to be part of your culture, no?
Pablo Gonzalez: Yeah, it means a lot to us, especially in Colombia. It gives them access to certain specialties and certain treatments faster than what you would get with a regular government medical insurance. For us, it just makes sense to take care of our people: physically, mentally, and sentimentally. For us, it’s the whole package: how we take care of our individuals.
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Again, I think having the facilities, having the medical insurance, and having all of these wellness programs available for our people, it just makes sense. It’s just basically in the DNA of TaskUs, and it comes very naturally for everybody that works here. I’m very happy to be part of an organization that thinks so holistically about their people and that truly, truly lives their people-first culture.
This interview transcript has been edited for length and clarity.