Hawkwood Featured in Forbes

Earlier this year, Forbes contributor Alison Coleman reached out to ask for our perspective on a trend we’ve been tracking closely: the post-2022 tendency among startups to delay their first HR hire.

The resulting piece – That First HR Hire Is Key To Unlocking Smarter Scaling For Startups – draws on voices from across the industry, including VC firms and People leaders at high-growth companies and Kristian, Founder of Hawkwood.

The data behind my input comes from Hawkwood’s own analysis. We looked at 30 Europe-based Series A AI startups and found that, despite a median headcount of 69, only four had a dedicated HR leader in place. Across the Atlantic, U.S. startups – typically better funded and larger in headcount – were actually hiring their first HR leaders even later.

The explanation isn’t complicated – the 2022 tech layoffs rewired how founders think about lean. Staying small became a badge of operational discipline, and in a world where speed is a genuine competitive advantage, that instinct isn’t entirely wrong.

Nonetheless, there can be real costs associated with waiting too long to build meaningful People infrastructure, often referred to as “people debt” – the accumulated cultural and leadership issues that quietly compound when there’s no one accountable for building a sustainable foundation. The longer it’s left, the harder and more expensive it becomes to untangle.

The piece also explores how the HR function itself has changed. As it evolved from an administrative role into a genuinely strategic one, it started attracting operators from sales, marketing, and ops – people with commercial instincts who could speak the language of founders.

The broader point, which the Forbes piece captures well, is that AI is changing the calculus. Startups can now automate a significant portion of what used to require a full HR function. The founders who’ll navigate growth best are the ones who know when to make that first hire, and who to hire when they do.

You can read the full article here.