‘Got rid of HR team’: Bolt CEO worth $300 million says ‘problems disappeared’ after firing HR, claims they created issues 'that didn’t exist’

The layoff season is here, and employees across the world are worried not only for their jobs, but also for their future and that of their families. Most fields including tech, have been opting for mass layoffs ever since AI took over most of the menial tasks performed by hired employees.While employees in teams across engineering and marketing have been laid off, the CEO of a $300 million company recently said that the team that should have layoffs is Human Resources. Ryan Breslow, CEO of Bolt explained why he himself got rid of his entire HR team recently. He defended his decision to enforce workforce cuts at his San Francisco-based company, which impacted around 30% of his staff earlier this year.Speaking at Fortune’s Workforce Innovation Summit on Tuesday, the 31-year-old said “We got rid of our HR team.”His rationale for the move was simple, he claimed that the HR team created problems that didn’t exist and those problems disappeared when they were let go. “We had an HR team, and that HR team was creating problems that didn’t exist,” he said. “Those problems disappeared when I let them go.”He also added that laying off HR was essential to resurrect Bolt, a company that was once valued at $11 billion but had now fallen to roughly $300 million. Breslow also reasoned that due to the company's downsizing the HR wasn’t needed anymore. “We’re back in startup mode again, and those HR professionals have really important insights when you’re in a peacetime and when you’re at a larger company,” he said.He revealed that a smaller people operations team had been hired to oversee training and serve as a resource for employees. “We need a group of people who are very oriented around getting things done, and there is just a culture of not getting things done and complaining a lot,” he said.Previously, in a 2025 LinkedIn post, Breslow wrote that HR is the “wrong energy, format, and approach.” “I’ve concluded that HR is the wrong energy, format, and approach. People ops empowers managers, streamlines decision making, and keeps the company moving at lightning speed,” he wrote.Founded in 2014 by Ryan Breslow and Eric Feldman, Bolt is a San Francisco-based company that provides single-click checkout solutions for e-commerce businesses. Breslow launched the company from his dorm room at Stanford University.In April 2026, the company underwent a major round of layoffs, cutting roughly 30% of its workforce as it shifted towards an AI-focused operating model. The layoffs were announced internally by founder and CEO Ryan Breslow, who informed that the company would become “leaner and more AI-centric.” He said that the way products are developed in 2026 has changed, thus making restructuring “unavoidable,” as per Banking Dive.