Episode 35

Scaling Smart: Avoiding Investor Fallout

Trust is everything in leadership. Lose it, and investors won’t think twice about making a change.

Maartje van Krieken takes a hard look at investor trust in scaling businesses as she breaks down why half of founder-CEOs don’t last three years after investment. When trust erodes, misalignment creeps in, and investors start questioning whether leadership can take the company to the next stage.

This episode explores founder-CEO transitions, the growing tension between long-term vision and investor demands, and the red flags that make investors lose confidence. Maartje shares what founders can do to strengthen these relationships before they unravel.


In the end, success depends on investor relations and business growth—how well leaders communicate, manage expectations, and handle feedback. If investors are watching, evaluating, and holding the power to pull funding, how can founders stay ahead of the curve?


Episode Breakdown:

00:00 Importance of Trust in Leadership

01:41 Benefits of Alignment with Investors

02:04 Recognizing Friction with Investors

04:14 Investors’ Frustration with Leadership

05:52 Strategic Risk Management Issues

07:32 Scaling Leadership and Bringing in Experienced Executives

09:21 Fixing Relationships with Investors

12:23 Agreeing on Escalation Protocols

13:30 Taking Investor Feedback Seriously

17:17 Being Proactive, Not Reactive

21:04 What Investors Can Do to Improve Alignment

23:44 Shared Strategic Risk Register


Links

Connect with Maartje van Krieken:

https://www.thechaosgamesconsulting.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/maartje/

https://maartjeturnschaosaround.substack.com/



Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

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Maartje van Krieken

Maartje van Krieken is a crisis strategist, executive consultant, and your at host of The Business Emergency Room podcast, where growing businesses go when things get messy. With a career that began in frontier oil and gas and spanned war zones, boardrooms, and billion-dollar pivots, Maartje has spent over two decades helping organizations steer through chaos and come out stronger.
Now through her consulting firm, The Chaos Games, Maartje works with medium-sized businesses, especially those scaling rapidly or navigating uncertainty, to diagnose breakdowns in leadership, collaboration, and decision-making before they become business emergencies. Her signature approach blends practical triage, people-first strategy, and blunt Dutch honesty to help teams realign fast.

​The Business Emergency Room delivers high-impact insights for business leaders, board members, and investors who are tired of the symptoms, disconnection, friction, paralysis, and want the tools to fix what’s really going wrong. Maartje’s episodes cut through fluff with stories, frameworks, and metaphors that turn even the most complex chaos into something leaders can act on.
Maartje is based in New Orleans and speaks regularly on navigating organizational storms, building business resilience, and turning reactive firefighting into proactive leadership. Whether you’re scaling a business, running a team, or dealing with dysfunction, The Business Emergency Room is the place to find straight talk and smarter tools.