Three years ago, we re-founded Vise. We cut our team from over 150 people to around 40. Everyone thought we were crazy.
Our burn dropped from $3M a month to under $1M. Product velocity increased. We scaled from under $1 billion in platform assets to over $50 billion. People told us you can’t scale with that few people. You need layers. You need VPs and Directors. You need middle management.
They were wrong.
But cutting headcount was only part of the solution. The deeper issue was how people thought about their roles—and the incentives baked into our structure.
We’re eliminating titles.
The standard playbook looks like this: hire good people with impressive titles and let them build teams beneath them. Create VPs and Directors. Add Senior Directors. Build layers between decision-makers and execution.
It sounds reasonable.
In practice, it optimizes for promotions, not outcomes.
People manage up. They protect territory. They build teams to justify scope. Customer problems move slowly through layers of approval.
We followed this model for years. At 150 people, we had the right titles and clean org charts. Execution slowed. The people closest to customers had the least authority to act. Decisions required sign-off from multiple layers, each adding friction.
We were operating in manager mode.
Founder mode requires something different.
Our structure is simple and explicit.
We have Heads of each core function—Head of Clients, Head of Investment Strategy, Head of Engineering, Head of Trading—with each function represented directly at the table. Within those functions are the people executing the work day-to-day.
In addition, we have Leads who own specific segments and domains (for example, Trading Leads). Ownership is defined by responsibility, not by title inflation.
There are no Vice Presidents. No Directors or Senior Directors. No “Principal” layers. If you own a function, you’re a Head. If you own a domain, you’re a Lead. If you’re building, you’re building.
There’s no ladder to climb and nowhere to hide.
This applies to us too. We are splitting our roles by function. Samir owns external: sales, partnerships, marketing. Runik owns internal: engineering, product, operations, finance. We're Co-Heads of Vise, defined entirely by what we actually do.
Ideas win on merit. Authority comes from execution. Influence comes from being right—and moving quickly.
Traditional hierarchies were designed for a world where leverage came from managing people.
That assumption no longer holds.
AI gives individuals far more leverage than before. The advantage now is speed. The companies that win are the ones that can identify a problem and ship a solution without delay.
Startups succeed by solving 10x problems. You want the fewest people possible working on the highest-impact work with full focus. The power law applies: a small number of people drive most outcomes. Adding layers increases drag. Drag slows decisions. Slow decisions lose.
You can already see this in practice.
When headcount dropped at X, output increased. Valve built a gaming business without traditional management for over a decade. Midjourney scaled one of the most capable AI products in the world with a small, flat team by maximizing individual leverage instead of adding hierarchy.
Small and flat outperforms layered bureaucracy.
If you’re an RIA or enterprise partner working with Vise, you’re not paying for our org chart. You’re paying for velocity.
Compared to other companies, we can move in days rather than quarters when you need something built. The person who hears your request can directly involve the person who can build it. No committees. No internal politics.
We deploy more than 2,700 product updates each year. Most wealth-tech companies deploy a handful of times per year. That difference is structural.
Eliminating titles keeps our focus on execution and customer outcomes. Everyone at Vise is here because they can solve hard problems—not because they’re optimizing to climb the hierarchy.
The next generation of companies won’t be defined by elaborate org charts. They’ll be defined by clear ownership, fast execution, and minimal distance between insight and action.
That’s the company we’re building.
Samir and Runik
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