Most founders obsess over their pitch deck. Fewer obsess over the numbers behind it.
Tristan Kemitzis, a fractional CFO who has worked with more than 30 early stage companies including Babylon Biosciences, Pave, Cato, and Inversa, sees this gap every day. He partners with Haven because clean books and fast responses make financial storytelling possible. Together, they help founders turn messy numbers into a story investors actually trust.
The Hard Part Nobody Tells You
You might think investors want perfect numbers. What they really want is a clear, logical view of how your business works today and how new capital will shape what comes next.
This is where most financial stories break.
Why Investors Care About the Story More Than the Spreadsheet
A financial story is not a prediction. It’s a test of how well you understand your own business. Investors know your model will be wrong (at least sometimes). They care about how you think, how you allocate capital, and how you react to the chaos that comes with running a startup.
A clean, simple narrative beats a 20 tab spreadsheet every time.
Start With the Truth in Your Books
Before you talk about growth, investors want to know they can trust your baseline. Messy books destroy credibility. Cash basis reports can be misleading. MRR often gets confused with annualized revenue. And annual contracts can get counted up-front instead of over time.
Haven fixes this part. Clean books create the foundation for everything that comes next. Once the actuals are right, Tristan can build a story that makes sense to both founders and investors.
If your numbers change every time you refresh a spreadsheet, the story falls apart.
Explain Revenue the Way Investors Expect
Too many founders think ARR = revenue. Or that a new signed deal shows up instantly. Or that prepaid annual cash is “runway.”
Investors know better.
Your story needs to show:
how revenue is recognized
how timing works for monthly vs annual plans
how churn and customer concentration impact the stability of your growth curve
how cash collection differs from GAAP revenue
When founders mix these up, investors immediately lose confidence. It’s exactly why founders work with frac CFOs like Tristan. He builds models that separate cash logic from accounting logic so the story is consistent and defensible.
Make Your Assumptions Defensible
Most financial stories fail because the assumptions behind them fall apart under questioning. Growth curves are too smooth. Sales cycles magically shorten. New hires show up but no milestone is tied to them.
Investors don’t just want the numbers. They want the reasoning.
A strong story ties every assumption to something real:
a hiring plan connected to milestones
a realistic customer acquisition strategy
conversion rates based on actual patterns
revenue broken out by segment, not guesswork
Visualizing the assumptions makes the weak spots obvious, and founders correct them fast.
Plan for More Than One Future
Investors always want to see what happens when things get worse, not just when things go right. A single forecast tells them nothing.
Strong financial stories include multiple paths:
base case
slower sales
higher costs
delayed enterprise deals
loss of a whale client
A founder who can explain how they would adjust hiring or spend in each scenario sends the strongest signal of all. It says you’re not guessing. You’re prepared.
Use Runway Levers Investors Know You’re Overlooking
Most founders try to solve everything with growth. But some of the biggest improvements come from timing.
Small operational levers matter:
speeding up collections
negotiating longer vendor terms
adjusting billing cycles
improving AR and AP timing
Haven provides clarity on what is actually happening. Tristan shows how each lever affects the model. Pair them together, and they have the ability to help founders extend runway without unrealistic assumptions.
Quick Wins
Low hanging fruit that can strengthen your story fast:
Recalculate burn using accrual numbers, not cash movement
Break out revenue by customer segment instead of one lump line
Map your next 3 hires to specific milestones
Stress test your model with a minus 20 percent sales scenario
Show ARR, GAAP revenue, and cash collection separately
Key Takeaways
Investors trust clean numbers, not optimistic models
Your assumptions and adaptability matter more than your totals
Revenue timing will make or break your credibility
Scenario planning shows maturity and preparedness
A simple narrative beats a complicated spreadsheet
Bottom Line
A strong financial story doesn’t need to be perfect. It needs to be honest, clear, and grounded in how your business actually works. Clean books give you the truth. Smart modeling turns that truth into a narrative investors believe. That combination moves a fundraise forward.
Learn more about Tristan and his work as a fractional CFO helping early founders here https://www.kemitzisconsulting.com/.