Wendy Moore
Founder
Eleve Talent
Episode 40
Scaling Startups? Master Strategic Hiring & AI for Sustainable Team Success
Current chapter: Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built By PeopleSeptember 26, 2025 · 12:19
Thesis
“In rapidly scaling, resource-conscious early-stage companies, strategic hiring, clear organizational design, and the wise adoption of technology (especially AI) are critical for building high-performing teams that thrive sustainably.”
Show notes
Early-stage startups have a hiring problem that nobody talks about honestly: every single hire matters more than it does in an established company, and most founders and operators don't have the infrastructure to hire well under pressure. Wendy Moore founded Eleve Talent to solve exactly that problem — and her philosophy is built around the uncomfortable reality that at 10 or 25 or 50 employees, a wrong hire doesn't just create friction. It can break the trajectory.
Wendy's core message is about role clarity — and she makes it before most companies think it's necessary. As teams scale rapidly, the confusion about who owns what, where decisions get made, and what "good" looks like in each role creates a kind of organizational friction that compounds quietly until it's expensive to unwind. Getting explicit about structure isn't bureaucracy. It's the foundation that lets talented people move fast without running into each other.
Her take on AI sits at the right level of specificity: it's not about replacing the humans in your HR function. It's about removing the friction that prevents them from doing their most valuable work. When AI handles the outreach, the scheduling, the candidate screening that doesn't require human judgment — the time that's recovered goes back to connection, leadership, and the genuinely hard judgment calls that no algorithm gets right. The companies that adopt AI well will compound that advantage year over year. The ones that don't will lose it to the ones that do.
What you'll learn:
- Why every hire is high-stakes in a startup — and how to build a hiring process that reflects that
- The role clarity framework that prevents organizational confusion during rapid scaling
- How to build compliance infrastructure before it becomes an emergency (multi-state, multi-country)
- How Wendy uses AI to remove friction from talent acquisition — and what that time buys back
- Why technology and strategic partnerships are force multipliers for lean HR teams
- The founder-to-CPO capability gap — and how fractional HR expertise bridges it
Built by People is presented by Previ — the free tool that helps HR teams boost internal communication engagement.
What you'll take away
- 1In competitive and resource-constrained markets, focus on strategic hiring to build lean, high-performing teams where every hire counts.
- 2Prioritize role clarity and agile organizational design to prevent confusion, friction, and burnout as startups rapidly scale.
- 3Leverage HR technology and AI tools to streamline processes, automate outreach, and remove friction, thereby creating space for essential human connection and leadership.
- 4Actively manage compliance infrastructure and legal HR advising, especially when expanding across states or countries, to avoid unforeseen exposure.
- 5Embrace AI as a tool to enhance the human experience in HR, not replace it, by adopting early and adapting wisely.
What most organizations get wrong
- •AI is not about replacing humans; it's about removing friction and creating the space for what only people can do, such as connection and leadership, which will always remain relevant.
In Wendy's words
“My career has always been centered around helping people build.”
This quote succinctly introduces her overarching career mission and passion for building.
“The biggest challenge right now, both for me, my internal team, and then also every client we serve is hiring strategically in a highly competitive market, but being very resource conscious.”
This identifies the core, current struggle for HR leaders in early-stage companies.
“When startups scale, pretty much everything breaks.”
A blunt, realistic assessment of the challenges of rapid growth, setting the stage for discussing solutions.
“The top 2 I see are role clarity and then the compliance infrastructure.”
Highlights specific, critical foundational areas that often fail during rapid startup growth.
“If I could just wave that magic wand, I would zero in on role clarity, the org design, and how that evolves as a company grows.”
Emphasizes her conviction about the single most impactful area for improvement in scaling organizations.
“My advice would be don't ignore AI. It is already reshaping how we build and scale teams.”
Her ultimate parting advice, stressing the undeniable and transformative impact of AI in HR.
The problems this episode addresses
- •Hiring strategically in a highly competitive and resource-constrained market, where every hire's impact and cost is under scrutiny.
- •Lack of clear role definitions and ownership in rapidly growing startups, leading to duplication of efforts, dropped responsibilities, and accountability issues.
- •Outdated or 'scrappy HR setups' breaking down as complexity increases, especially when expanding across states or countries, leading to compliance risks.
- •Difficulty for founders to get out of the 'weeds' of operational HR tasks (tweaking workflows, rewriting processes) when they are both builders and editors.
- •Struggling to build lean yet high-performing teams that can still deliver under pressure and extreme uncertainty in the funding landscape.
In this episode
Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built by People
Wendy Moore from Elevate Talent joins Built by People podcast
Built by People
The biggest challenge in HR is hiring strategically in a highly competitive market
What's the Biggest Challenge in HR?
What's keeping you up at night working with your clients during the season
What's Keeps You Up at Night?
When startups scale, pretty much everything breaks
What's the HR culture that's broken as startups scale?
What tools or partners are most critical to you today, or even maybe clients
What Tools or Partners Are Most Critical to Your Company's Growth?
Wendy: I'm hoping to see orgs running smoothly
WSJD Live: The orgs
People leaders have a responsibility to lean into AI to help build teams
A Day in the Life of AI
Wendy, thanks for joining us on Built by People podcast
Built by People Podcast
Topics covered
Organizations and entities mentioned
Full transcript
Expand transcript (0 words)
Transcript is not available yet.