Abolishing HR

News.com.au reports:

A high-profile tech CEO has sparked debate after revealing he quietly axed his entire human resources department earlier this year.

Ryan Breslow, CEO of Bolt Financial, claims the HR team at the fintech firm was “creating problems that didn’t exist” and fostering a culture of complaining rather than productivity.

“The problems disappeared when I let [the team] go,” the Stanford University graduate, 32, claimed, according to The New York Post.

He is not the only CE to do this or discover this. I recall chatting some years ago to a very very successful CEO and he said that his first step in every new company he took over was to scrap the entire HR department, tell managers they are responsible for managing their own staff teams, and that there is an external law firm they can access for legal advice on employment issues. This CEO said that without fail the improvement in happiness in the company was huge.

Sally Clarke, a burnout and wellbeing consultant, told news.com.au that erasing HR is a “fickle” move that is “bound to backfire”.

A burnout consultant!!