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🤖 HR replaced by AI: Fact or fallacy?

😶‍🌫️ The headcount shift: Scaling in the age of AI

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HR replaced by AI: Fact or fallacy?

I’ve been hearing the same questions on repeat lately. And you know me 😅 — when that happens, I don’t keep copy-pasting answers. I scale it. I write it down so I can just point people here 👇 *grins cheekily*

We didn’t sign up for this (but here we are)

None of us went into HR thinking we’d one day be talking APIs, automation and data pipelines. We signed up for people, not platforms. But the ground is shifting under our feet. HR is colliding with tech — not because it’s ‘trendy,’ but because that’s where the business is headed. And if we want to stay commercially relevant, we need to move with it.

From my perspective, I don’t think it’s “tech” we’re scared of, but losing the part of HR that makes us human. The conversations. The gut instinct. The deep understanding of people and culture that no algorithm can replicate. But no founder, VC or board is going to wait for HR to catch up while the rest of the business is being re-engineered by AI. Stand still, and risk being sidelined.

Not a 180-degree change, just a new spike 

This isn’t about turning HR into software engineers. It’s about adding a new spike to our skill set. Just like great HR leaders learn finance to talk to a CFO, we now need to learn enough about AI, automation and data to hold our own in business conversations with Founders.

We need to answer with confidence:

• What work actually needs to be done to achieve our growth goals?

• What of that work must be human-led, and what can be automated?

• How do we redesign roles, teams and capabilities in a way that scales profitably?

The idea that “HR will be replaced by a Chief of Staff with ChatGPT” is pure fantasy. But it’s a fantasy that gains traction if we don’t claim the tech space as part of our remit. IT can’t “own” AI for the whole business. People are still at the centre of execution. And HR is the function that knows how humans adopt change, learn new skills and thrive in transformed environments. That makes us indispensable — if we step up.

Building for scale is still the goal

At the build-to-scale stage (that brutal 2–3 year stretch where 80% of start-ups fail), our job isn’t just to run HR. It’s to turn the organisation into a growth engine. That means:

• Partnering with tech to design future-proof org structures.

• Equipping every team to use AI and tools that boost productivity without killing culture.

• Leading the hard conversations on capability gaps and workforce redesign.

The HR leaders who thrive won’t treat tech as “outside our lane.” They’ll treat it as another tool in our toolkit — alongside talent, culture and comp strategy. We don’t need to love code. We just need to love solving business problems. And AI, automation and data are simply new levers to pull.

We have a choice to make

So here’s the choice: let the wave hit and hope we stay afloat — or grab the wheel and steer.  The build-to-scale stage is crucial for a start-up. But if we master both the human and the tech levers, we don’t just survive it. We lead it.

Get curious. Get strategic. And yes…get a little bit techy. Because the HR leaders who can talk headcount and tech stack in the same breath are the ones who will help their start-ups adapt and thrive through this wave of change.

The headcount shift: Scaling in the age of AI

AI’s impact on HR is one of the hottest topics right now. So, I invited Stephen Millard, Chief Platform Officer at Notion Capital, to our STEP UP Boardroom community’s Business Intel session. Strategic HR leaders don’t stay in their lane — they broaden their perspective. That’s what Business Intel is all about: taking members beyond the HR bubble into deeper conversations with other business leaders.

This time, we looked through a VC’s lens. Because VCs are asking the very same big question: “How will AI reshape headcount, org design and the work we do?”

Stephen set the stage for the conversation with: “We’re at the start of an era as big as the industrial or digital revolutions. The difference? Looking backwards, we know how those played out. With AI, we don’t yet know what will stick. Will it mean billion-dollar companies built by 10 people — or will the fundamentals of scaling teams stay the same?”

Three questions HR leaders asked

There were plenty of questions and lively discussions, but these 3 felt especially worth sharing with you.

Astrid Riber Poulsen (VP People at Creative Force):
“Unlike AI-native start-ups, we already have established processes. How do we integrate AI into them without breaking what works?”

Stephen’s answer: Legacy companies face the dual challenge of adapting existing systems while building future capabilities. Start small: embed AI where it directly solves current pain points and train champions in each team. Incremental adoption beats wholesale disruption.

Stephanie Jade Thomas (Head of HR at PowerUs):
“I hear VCs saying founders can skip hiring HR by putting a hungry chief of staff in with AI tools. Is HR really at risk of being replaced?”

Stephen’s answer: “Total BS.” AI may transform work, but people issues — culture, clarity, communication, performance — are only growing in complexity. What will change is talent density: those who embrace AI as empowerment will thrive; those who resist will fall behind. HR’s role in building that capability is more vital, not less.

Thomas Forstner (VP People at Juro):
“Why are AI-native companies hiring so aggressively? Shouldn’t they be leaner?”

Stephen’s answer: many AI-native start-ups are solving previously unsolvable problems with unstructured data. Once they find product-market fit, they need human capacity (e.g. engineers, sales, customer teams) to exploit the opportunity quickly. The “100m revenue with 10 people” story is the anomaly, not the norm. The fastest growing companies in this era are smaller, but they aren’t small and many are still hiring aggressively.

Business Intel key takeaway

Nobody knows exactly how AI will reshape headcount. But one thing is clear: AI should be treated less like a tool and more like a collaborator—helping teams question, experiment, and solve problems faster.

The start-ups that survive will balance automation with human judgment, clarity and creativity.

Or, as Stephen put it: “It’s dangerous to assume billion-dollar companies with 10 people will be the norm. Complexity still requires people. The art is deciding what work truly needs them.”

Scaling your start-up?

Let’s make sure your leadership, people and org are ready. Here are 3 ways I can help:

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