Build the Finance Skills That Move You Towards CFO
Your technical training gives you the foundation. CFO Academy builds the commercial layer on top: financial modelling, business planning, funding, investor communication and the judgement to turn numbers into decisions.
What is The CFO Academy?
The CFO Academy is a six-course programme with 10+ hours of video and lifetime access, teaching the commercial finance skills behind senior finance careers: financial modelling, business planning, financial storytelling, investment analysis, funding and commercial judgement. It is taught by Mohamed Chaudry FCCA, a CFO with 25 years of experience who has raised and advised on $300M+ and led five exits. The Academy is $199, one payment, and the first course is free.
Find where you are. See what gets you to the next level.
The skills that make you good at one finance role are not always the skills that get you promoted into the next one. Choose where you are today and see the capability gap you need to close.
Your Qualification Builds the Foundation. Now Build the Commercial Layer.
ACCA, CIMA, ACA, a finance degree or years of practical experience give you a strong technical foundation. Senior finance asks for another layer: knowing how the numbers influence cash, growth, funding, strategy and decisions.
TECHNICAL FINANCE
Accounting · Reporting · Controls · Compliance · Financial fundamentals
Modelling · Funding · Business planning · Investor thinking · Financial communication · Decision-making
Technical finance helps you understand the numbers. Commercial finance helps you influence what happens next.
Take Course 1 of CFO Academy Free
Before you pay for anything, learn with me first. You get the complete first course, Funding & Investment Readiness: the major funding options, what makes a business fundable, what investors and lenders actually assess, and how funding decisions affect strategy and cash.
Get instant access
Enter your details and Course 1 lands in your inbox. After that, a short run of practical finance lessons.
I’ve Spent 25 Years Using Finance to Make Real Business Decisions.
I’ve worked on both sides of the table: as a CFO, as a founder, raising capital, building businesses, presenting to boards, reviewing investments and hiring finance teams. CFO Academy takes the practical finance skills I’ve used throughout that career and teaches you how to apply them yourself. Nothing in it is theory I have read about. It is all work I have done, and work I have hired people to do.
Trusted in Finance, Funding and Corporate Transactions.
The principles inside CFO Academy come from work carried out with businesses, banks, investors and corporate finance professionals.
“Mohamed is highly experienced in securing finance for his clients. The level of preparation and quality of documentation was exceptional.”
“His accountancy and corporate finance background means that he knows what information is required and how to present it.”
“Mohamed brought creativity and flair to the SME deals he was handling. A man of integrity who demonstrates professionalism.”
You Don’t Need to Be a CFO. You Need to Want to Think Like One.
CFO Academy is for finance professionals who want to move beyond processing and reporting numbers into understanding what those numbers mean for the business.
Students & trainees
Turn theory into practical finance skills you can talk about in interviews and take into your first role.
Junior accountants
Move beyond accounting and develop modelling, planning and commercial skills that broaden your career options.
Analysts & FP&A
Get closer to the decision by strengthening modelling, forecasting, investor thinking and financial communication.
Finance managers
Prepare for leadership by developing the commercial, funding and strategic capability expected at FD and CFO level.
The Work Senior Finance Professionals Are Expected to Understand.
You’ll learn through real CFO work: models, plans, investment materials and funding decisions. But the real value isn’t the document. It’s learning how to think behind it.
Financial Modelling
Turn assumptions into decisions.
Understand how revenue, costs, working capital and funding flow through the P&L, balance sheet and cash flow, and what happens to each when an assumption moves.
Business Planning
Connect strategy to numbers.
Learn how commercial assumptions, operations, growth plans and financial forecasts fit together, and where boards and lenders push hardest on a plan.
Financial Storytelling
Explain the numbers clearly.
Learn how financial analysis becomes a coherent narrative for management, boards and investors, and why the same numbers land differently depending on how they are framed.
Investment Analysis
Think from the other side of the table.
Understand what investors challenge, what creates confidence, and where financial assumptions tend to break under scrutiny.
Funding & Capital
Understand how businesses finance growth.
Learn the major funding options, how investors are targeted, how use of funds is structured, and how finance supports a capital raise from preparation to close.
Commercial Judgement
Move from reporting to influencing.
Learn to challenge assumptions, ask better questions, and use finance to shape business decisions rather than describe them after the fact.
Your CEO Doesn’t Want an Accounting Lesson. They Want an Answer.
These are the kinds of questions that land on the desk as you move closer to senior finance. None of them are answered by knowing the standards.
Technical knowledge gets you into finance. Commercial judgement is what makes people start asking for your opinion.
Behind the Scenes of the Courses
How the courses are taught, what the material looks like, and how the six fit together.
Six Courses. One Commercial Finance Pathway.
Work through the same areas of finance CFOs meet when businesses plan growth, raise capital and talk to investors. Each course builds on the last, which is why they are taught as one pathway rather than sold separately. Open any course to see what is inside it.
01 Funding & Investment ReadinessFunding fundamentals Free
Learn how businesses finance growth and how a CFO evaluates the options. This is the foundation the other five build on, and it is the course we give away in full.
- Understand debt, equity and alternative funding
- Learn what makes a business fundable
- See what investors and lenders actually assess
- Understand how funding decisions affect strategy and cash
02 Investment Teasers & Financial CommunicationFinancial communication
Learn how a complex business and its financial information are distilled into a document a decision-maker can understand in sixty seconds.
- Understand the purpose and structure of an investment teaser
- Identify the financial and commercial information that matters
- Learn how traction and performance are communicated
- Turn analysis into concise executive-level communication
03 Business Planning & Commercial StrategyBusiness planning
Learn how strategy, operations and financial forecasts come together in a plan that survives being challenged by people who read plans for a living.
- Structure a professional business plan
- Connect commercial assumptions to financial forecasts
- Understand scalability, resources and operational planning
- Learn how boards, lenders and investors challenge a plan
04 Pitch Decks & Financial StorytellingFinancial storytelling
Learn how financial information becomes a clear investment and board-level narrative, and why the order you present numbers in changes how they are received.
- Understand what belongs in an effective pitch deck
- Translate traction, forecasts and strategy into a coherent story
- Explain use of funds and expected outcomes
- Present financial information clearly to senior decision-makers
05 Financial Modelling & ProjectionsThe flagship · Financial modelling
The flagship. You build an integrated model from the ground up and learn how a CFO interprets the outputs, not simply how to populate a spreadsheet.
- Build an integrated P&L, balance sheet and cash-flow forecast
- Understand how assumptions flow through the model
- Model revenue, costs, working capital and funding requirements
- Stress-test assumptions and interpret their impact on cash
06 Investors & Capital RaisingCapital raising
What happens when a business moves from preparing for funding to actually approaching the market, and what the finance function is responsible for at each stage.
- Learn how investors are researched and selected
- Understand investor fit, mandate and stage
- Learn how a CFO prepares for investor conversations
- See real 60-second and 3-minute pitch examples
All six courses. One payment. Lifetime access.
You’ve seen the curriculum. This is everything, including the models and templates you keep.
Not ready yet? Start Course 1 freeDon’t Just Say You Understand Finance. Have Work You Can Talk About.
You’ll work through practical CFO outputs and frameworks you can discuss in interviews, development conversations and future roles.
An integrated financial model
A pitch deck framework
An investment teaser
A business planning frameworkWhat Students Say After Working Through the Academy.
Real feedback from people who have used the courses to understand modelling, funding, investor communication and commercial finance in practice.
Get the Complete CFO Academy
Six practical courses designed to help you move from understanding finance to using it commercially.
Common questions.
What skills do I need to become a CFO?
What is the difference between technical finance and commercial finance?
How do I learn financial modelling for a finance career?
Is CFO Academy only for people who want to become CFOs?
Is this a replacement for ACCA, CIMA or ACA?
Is this a fundraising course?
Can I try it before buying?
Do I need to be working in finance already?
I have tried free YouTube tutorials. How is this different?
Can I buy the courses individually?
What will I have at the end?
How long do I have access?
What is the refund policy?
Start Building the Skills Behind Finance Leadership
Whether you’re trying to land your first finance role or preparing for your first CFO role, the next step is the same: build the skills that move you beyond reporting the numbers.