Bolt CEO Ryan Breslow eliminated his entire Human Resources (HR) department after determining it was doing more harm than good.
Bolt is an established Fintech that has grown from payments and anti-fraud services to offering banking, crypto, and more. At one point, Bolt had a valuation of $11 billion during peak Fintech. A more recent valuation is more diminished as reports pegging the firm’s value at around $300 million in 2025.
Taking to X, Breslow confirmed they whacked their entire HR team: “I can confirm. We did get rid of our HR team. Anyone who loves creating problems vs solving them has no place at a startup. Bolt is now operating once again as a startup and at Lightning Speed.”
It seems the decision was actually made in 2025 when Breslow posted:
“Bolt has eliminated its HR department. Instead, we now have people ops. More focused on efficiency, less focused on fluff. This doesn’t mean we don’t value culture, oversight, or checks and balances. In fact, the opposite. We care deeply about these topics. However, we believe there’s a better way to do it; and one without middlemen getting in the way of our teammates and their managers. For serious employee treatment issues, someone can escalate to a superior or people ops team member. But after several experiments, including Conscious Culture, I’ve concluded that HR is the wrong energy, format, and approach. People ops empowers managers, stream.”
It appears that others agree with the decision to eliminate HR, a department that, at times, can be a hammer looking for a nail.
Joe Lonsdale, a founder of Palentir, confirmed the company had no HR department from inception – avoiding Breslow’s problems. He advised that “Going into the vast majority of companies and firing most of their HR and Marketing departments would tend to create value!”
Breslow reposted a statement on X that explained HR like this: “The HR department exists for one reason: to perpetuate the HR department.”
As companies grow, they tend to institute controls as operations can become unwieldy. Middle management grows, adding to bureaucratic processes and standardization, and an HR department can create known rules for operations. At the same time, as many companies go big, they lose the fire, innovation, and creativity that got them there. This loss of vision and stifling rules can eventually kill a company. In a fast-paced environment like Fintech, where change happens at an accelerated pace and survival can hinge on a single decision, Breslow seems to have made the right one. This will, of course, make HR departments, those who live for structure, and vendors (looking at you, SAP), sad.