chef-client service fails to start on Windows 2012

The Chef Client service fails to start on Windows Server 2012, with the following events logged:

"A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds) while waiting for the Chef-client Service for Windows service to connect."

"The Chef-client Service for Windows service failed to start due to the following error: 
The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion."

Setting the service startup type to Automatic (delayed start) fixes it.