A lot of high growth companies simply hire too many people because too many people is usually better for maximizing growth rate than too few people. (If a compa

A lot of high growth companies simply hire too many people because too many people is usually better for maximizing growth rate than too few people. (If a company's focus shifts from maximizing growth rate to, e.g., optimizing for cash flow or profit instead of growth rate, the equation shifts and lay offs happen) Having extra people on staff who aren't needed can be good as long as you expect to need them in the near future. That obviously creates the risk of needing to terminate the positions if the need for the person never materializes. It takes 2-3 months to hire someone after opening a role, and 6-9 months to onboard them. So 8-12 months to fill a role with someone fully up and running. That's a really long time which is why so many high growth companies fill roles they don't actually need right now.