9 November 2026
The doctor who never touched me
An ICU doctor who never touched me showed me what confidence in a leader looks like. Not having the answer, but knowing your role.
Articles
Articles by Sjoerd Maas
Every week I write about what happens when a founder becomes the bottleneck, and what changes when you let go. Some stories come from the companies I work with, some from home. They are published on sjoerdmaas.com, where you can also subscribe.
New to the idea? Start with What is founder dependency?
31 October 2026
Thirty seconds to train a bottleneck
Thirty seconds is how long it took a CEO to fix a problem that was not his to fix. Everyone at the table learned something he never meant to teach them.
19 October 2026
Four rewrites and a shoe that wouldn’t go on
The CEO Parent is out. Paperback and Kindle, on Amazon, with my name on the cover and nothing left to change.
13 October 2026
This is out of date, by the way
The paper is out of date, and so is the founder’s picture. The people who know how your company really works are already on your payroll.
7 October 2026
Twenty minutes about a button
Teams follow the founder’s attention. One phone call from the beach reshuffled their whole week, and nobody ever decided it should.
27 September 2026
We packed away half their toys
My sons didn’t get more disciplined. The distraction left the building.
21 September 2026
Always be the dumbest person in the room
Never losing an argument in your own company isn’t proof you’re right. It’s proof you’re the boss.
15 September 2026
You hire for ownership. Then you onboard it away
Most companies spend a new hire’s first month training out the exact instinct they hired them for.
7 September 2026
Stop hiring your way out of the problem
Most founders default to ‘who do I need to hire next’ when revenue climbs. It is the wrong first question.
4 September 2026
Nobody taught you how to lead a team either
What a parenting book taught me about the difference between solving problems for people and giving them a destination to walk towards.
The CEO Parent is out now
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