Most Series A companies make the same mistake with their first VP of People hire.
They wait until something breaks — a bad hire that costs six months, a culture problem that surfaces in an all-hands, a departing engineer who cites “poor management” in their exit interview. Then they panic-hire a People leader and expect them to fix everything in 90 days.
The result is usually a mismatch. The company needed an operator. They hired a strategist. Or vice versa.
Here’s what the role should actually look like at Series A — and what strong performance means in the first year.
What Series A Actually Needs From a People Leader
At Series A you typically have 15-40 people, have just raised $5-15M, and are about to double headcount in 12 months. The people problems you have are:
- Hiring is chaotic — no consistent process, offers going out inconsistently, candidates dropping off mid-process
- Onboarding is nonexistent — new hires are thrown in and expected to figure it out
- Performance is managed informally — good work is praised in Slack, bad work is avoided until it becomes a crisis
- Compensation is inconsistent — people doing similar jobs are on different pay for no principled reason
- Culture is founder-defined but not documented — it exists in the founder’s head, not in any system
A VP of People at Series A is not a strategic CHRO. They are a builder. They need to create the infrastructure that doesn’t exist yet — without bureaucratising a company that needs to stay fast.
The First 90 Days — What Good Looks Like
Days 1-30: Audit and listen
A strong VP of People spends the first month asking questions, not implementing answers. They interview every team lead, review every existing process, and audit the current state of hiring, compensation, and performance.
The output: a written assessment of the 3 most critical people problems and a prioritised plan. Not a 40-slide deck. A 2-page document.
Days 31-60: Fix the most urgent thing
Usually hiring. At Series A, growth is the priority and broken hiring is the most expensive problem. A good VP of People in month 2 has overhauled the hiring process — structured interviews, consistent scorecards, a clear offer framework.
Use this prompt to build the interview framework fast:
“We are a [stage] B2B SaaS startup hiring rapidly across [functions]. Our current hiring process is inconsistent — different interviewers ask different questions and we have no scoring rubric. Design a structured hiring framework that: works across functions, takes no more than 3 rounds, includes a scoring rubric, and can be implemented in 2 weeks. Be specific and practical.”
Days 61-90: Build the performance foundation
Before you can manage performance you need to define it. A strong VP of People by day 90 has defined what good looks like for every function — not a generic competency framework, but specific descriptions of strong performance for each role.
What Great Looks Like at 6 Months
- Time-to-hire is down and offer acceptance rate is up
- Every new hire has a written 30-60-90 day plan before their first day
- Compensation bands exist and are defensible
- There is a performance review process that people actually use
- The founder is spending less time on people problems
That last one is the real metric. A VP of People at Series A has done their job when the founder stops being the de facto HR department.
What to Look For When Hiring This Role
The worst interview question for a VP of People is “tell me about your people philosophy.” It produces aspirational answers that tell you nothing.
Use this prompt to generate better questions:
“I am interviewing candidates for a VP of People role at a 25-person Series A B2B SaaS startup. We need someone who can build from scratch — no existing HR infrastructure, no team, no established processes. Generate 5 interview questions that specifically test whether a candidate can operate in a build environment vs a manage environment. Focus on what they’ve actually created, not what they’ve overseen.”
The Honest Reality
The best VP of People hire at Series A is usually someone who has been a Senior HR Business Partner or Head of People at a company that scaled from 20 to 100 people. They’ve seen what breaks, they know how to build fast, and they’re not precious about process for its own sake.
They’re probably not the person with the impressive corporate CHRO title. That person will build you a beautiful system that slows you down.
Get the Full Hiring Prompt Library
15 prompts covering every stage of the hiring process — free download.
