Executive Leadership

GAP was co-founded in 2007 by CEO Joyce Durst, who has over 30 years of experience in the technology industry. The company's rapid growth and its technical excellence are attributed to Joyce's vision for prioritizing people, and creating more opportunities for women and other under-represented communities in technology. Over the last year, Joyce has led GAP to achieve new company milestones and successfully steered the company through the pandemic without loss of jobs or revenue.

Joyce is a sought-after speaker on leadership and women in business, and is active with the Women Presidents Organization and Special Olympics. She mentors women CEOs and first-time entrepreneurs, and has won several prestigious industry awards, including the Executive Leadership award from the Greater Austin Chamber; Profiles in Power award from the Austin Business Journal, and Stevie Award for Achievement in Developing and Promoting Women, Entrepreneur of the Year award and the Austin Tech Hall of Fame.

As Chief Technology Officer & Chief Customer Success Paul is responsible for GAP’s software lifecycle delivery processes, from concept through execution and maintenance. He advises clients on product strategy, technical requirements, and network architecture, continuously calibrating GAP’s service offerings to reflect changing industry conditions and client needs.

In the early 2000's, while working in product management for BMC Software, Paul unexpectedly inherited two international teams due to an acquisition; one in England, and one in Israel. Shortly thereafter he was asked to build an offshore team in India. This formative experience took Paul through the challenges and rewards of building and managing distributed global Agile teams. It helped him develop a lifelong appreciation for working across different cultures and geographies. Paul is an Agile evangelist, focused on Agile transformation, Agile environments, and scaling distributed teams in accordance with the Agile SAFe framework.

Paul’s favorite pastimes are skydiving and building high-performance PCs. Sadly, he has yet to find a good way to combine the two.

Michelle manages the financial side of the business, focusing on forecasting, international business management, reporting and analysis. She was instrumental in opening GAP’s state-of-the-art Centers of Excellence in LATAM, as well as working with Costa Rican and Colombian governments on securing Free Trade Zone designations for GAP’s Latin American operations. Michelle enjoys the challenges and intricacies of steering a multinational operation, and her success is due in part to a passion for working with people across all disciplines and backgrounds. She loves that at GAP people are encouraged to stretch beyond their perceived limitations, and are fully supported while doing it.

Michelle is a CPA with more than 22 years of experience. Prior to joining GAP in 2006, she worked for several software companies in the Austin area. Outside of work she is an avid gardener, a mom of three kids, one of whom is adopted, and is involved with Project Care Case - a non-profit that donates suitcases with clothes, toys, and personal items to kids moving around the foster care system.

With a unique mix of technical expertise and marketing savvy, coupled with over 30 years of industry experience, Darryl enjoys blending multiple business disciplines and turning them into fuel for strategic business growth. Using his expertise in AI, security, and product life-cycle management, Darryl applies strategic direction and functional expertise to nurture and grow GAP’s existing client relationships, as well as build new ones.

When he was first starting out in sales, Darryl genuinely believed that marketing was easy, until he was promoted to marketing, and realized that he needed a whole new set of skills to succeed. This set the stage for an exploration of other disciplines like product management and building a cohesive skill set that served as a foundation for executive leadership. As a two-time CEO, Darryl is a lifelong learner and mentor. He is committed to transparency about both his achievements and shortcomings, using his experiences as points of learning and encouragement for others, and never taking himself too seriously. Darryl appreciates good wine, and if there was any more room on his business card, he would love to add “sommelier” to his credentials.

Michael Labate is an award-winning commercial leader with over 20 years of experience in technology marketing and sales. Recognized for his ability to build, restructure and scale global sales and marketing teams, Michael specializes in driving value creation for private and publicly traded companies. As GAP's Chief Revenue & Marketing Officer (CRMO) for the Engineering Business Unit (EBU), he will play a key role in expanding market share and accelerating growth.

Michael has a proven track record of establishing profitable, revenue-generating business strategies across multiple go-to-market motions, including product strategy consulting, managed services and team extensions. His expertise spans technology, automotive, banking and finance, telecom, retail, media and entertainment and manufacturing, among others.

Before joining GAP, Michael spent a year as Chief Revenue Officer, advisory board member and investor at FROM, The Digital Transformation Agency; three years as North America President and advisory board member at Intellias; and one year as CRO at Trackunit. He also spent 14 years as a sales and marketing executive at SAP, where he was instrumental in optimizing digital sales channels, leading sales strategy and deal execution, and driving global ROI on SAP's social selling initiatives. His leadership and strategies contributed to increasing conversions of more than EUR $2 billion in marketing and sales pipeline. He also spearheaded a digital advertising business unit that generated thousands of leads, fueling new revenue for SAP's largest channel partners.

Previously, Michael served as CEO of a software development outsourcing company for a decade, supporting mid-market and large enterprise clients such as Citrix, Motorola, JM Family Enterprises, Firehouse Subs and Toyota. His leadership experience also includes M&A and transaction work for portfolio companies backed by private equity firms including SoftBank, Trivest Partners, HG Capital and Horizon Capital. In recognition of his career achievements in revenue and growth, Michael was named "CRO of the Year" in 2024 at the Sales 3.0 Conference in Las Vegas for IT Services, the leading conference for B2B sales and revenue leaders.

Michael holds a business degree from Penn State University and an MBA from Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. He lives in South Florida with his wife, Rachel, and their two children.

Andrea is GAP’s Chief People Officer. She is passionate about creating a company culture that is welcoming, inclusive, and collegial. Since joining GAP in 2010, Andrea has focused on building and scaling our unique culture as GAP grew from 10 to over 300 employees, extending its geographic footprint to six locations throughout Costa Rica and Colombia.

Andrea leads a team responsible for human resources, candidate marketing, learning and development, and facilities for all of GAP’s Latin American operations. Her superpower is making things happen. She excels at translating abstract concepts into actionable plans and making sure they are successfully implemented. As a psychologist, Andrea’s favorite thing about working at GAP is getting treated like a real person; being heard, understood and supported in a way that promotes sustainable, long-term growth for both the company and employee.

Andrea has a degree in Psychology, as well as an MBA from the University of Costa Rica. She also holds a Six Sigma Green Belt certification through the American Society for Quality (ASQ). A quote you are most likely to hear from Andrea at work is: “do we have coffee?”

Milagro joined GAP in 2023 as GAP's Vice President of Delivery. Since she was a kid, she has focused on positively impacting the lives of the people around her, which drives her to encourage her teams to bring out the best in themselves. Mila leads the team responsible for acting as client advocates and advisors, and working on creating loyal customers for life. She ensures the team delivers from start to finish on each project with the value, quality, transparency and excellent customer experience that characterizes GAP.

She has a degree in economics and business. Mila has built a career with more than 20 years of expertise in people management and delivery processes in digital agencies and technology environments. She specializes in project management, LEAN and Six Sigma applications, paired with strong leadership skills. Mila loves American football and is a big fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers. She has been the only woman on an NFL fan team in Costa Rica for 16 years, and she loves celebrating her birthday with chicken lasagna (and has a no-cake policy).

Kenneth Rivera, Vice President of Engineering, brings over 24 years of extensive experience as a technology executive and engineering leader with teams across the globe. With a background that spans directing teams on large corporations and medium-sized companies, Kenneth has successfully led across various domains, including: Cloud Sales, Development, IT, HR, Finance, PMO and Customer Success Units.

In his current role at Growth Acceleration Partners, Kenneth takes on the responsibility of overseeing engineering operations, shaping strategy, and cultivating a positive and effective engineering culture.

Kenneth has a degree of Information Systems and MBA specializing in Finance, during his personal time, he dedicates his passion to photography.

With 20+ years of experience, Jocelyn Sexton is a marketing maven who builds and leads high-performing teams across the globe. She's a master connector, gaining assurance between marketing and other critical business functions, and earning trust with clients and key stakeholders across industries. She oversees all aspects of GAP’s marketing: from brand awareness, PR and demand generation, to sales enablement, internal communications and recruitment marketing.

After earning an MBA from the University of Texas at Austin — Hook ‘Em! — Jocelyn became hyper-focused on data, using analytics and insights to make informed decisions that drive results and quickly maximize opportunities. She's also an expert in change management, helping teams adapt to new processes, technologies and challenges with ease. She has a decade of corporate marketing experience — including roles at Fortune 500 technology companies — in addition to working in state government and electric cooperatives.

Jocelyn enjoys reading, blogging, hiking, boating and traveling to new places (plus making annual trips to favorite places) with her husband and their two kids.

Dee Dee Walsh is a software and tech veteran who has spent decades building developer communities in the Microsoft, open source and Snowflake ecosystems. She enjoys skiing and eating donuts.

Connect with her on LinkedIn and Twitter

Erika joined GAP as a web developer in 2009 and led for seven years as VP of Delivery before being named VP of Information Services. Erika’s core mission is leveraging technology and optimizing processes to support GAP’s mission. Erika ensures seamless access to information, drives innovative digital initiatives, and enhances business processes for improved efficiency and productivity.

Her favorite topics include digital transformation, process optimization, agile and leadership development. She enjoys hikes in nature, playing board games, gardening and solving jigsaw puzzles.