Startup HR That Doesn’t Kill the Culture

What actually happens when a startup starts to scale?

In this episode of Let’s Table That, we sit down with Holly, a veteran of the Kitchener-Waterloo tech ecosystem, to talk about the realities of building teams inside growing companies.
People Ops wasn’t always seen as strategic. For a long time, it lived in the background, handling things like payroll, policies, and paperwork.

But as startups scale, founders quickly realize something: people decisions are business decisions.

Holly has spent years helping companies navigate that shift. From early hiring to building leadership teams, she’s seen how culture, structure, and leadership evolve as organizations grow. And she’s also seen where things go wrong.

Because scaling a company doesn’t just mean growing headcount. It’s about building the systems, trust, and leadership needed to support all the new hires, and the existing ones too.

In this episode, we talk about:
• How People Ops evolved from administrative support to strategic leadership
• The right time for startups to invest in their first People Ops hire
• Why hiring “big company” talent doesn’t always work in startups
• The common scaling mistakes founders make
• Why copying corporate playbooks can backfire
• The difference between managing people and actually leading them
• What founders underestimate about the human side of growth

If you’ve ever:
• Joined a startup during a period of rapid growth
• Wondered when companies should invest in People Ops
• Seen culture start to crack as teams scale

‍
Pull up a chair.

‍