Finance Academy · The home of Financial Decision Intelligence

Stop nodding along when the numbers come up.

Finance Academy teaches managers and founders to read the numbers and decide with confidence, through stories, simulators and AI.

Take the 5-minute assessment Try a decision simulator

15,000+ professionals trained across 4 countries since 2014

The teaching behind the method

Trusted to teach finance & business
at universities across three continents.

Lecturer and course designer for E-MBA and entrepreneurship programs.
Author of The Bottomline, with a foreword by a Harvard finance professor.
Former National Treasurer, Professional Speakers Australia.

Chinmay Ananda speaking on the TEDx stage — TEDx speaker

Chinmay Ananda teaching from his green-screen studio — Educator

Chinmay Ananda keynoting a major business event — Keynote speaker at major events

Chinmay Ananda with his book The Bottomline — 2× author

The real problem

It was never about intelligence. It was about language.

You’ve sat in that meeting. The conversation turns to margins, working capital, EBITDA, and the room quietly divides into the people who lean in and the people who nod along.

Here’s the secret: the language of business is numbers, and it only has four words.

Money comes in
Money goes out
Money expected to come in
Money expected to go out

Every financial statement ever printed is a combination of those four. You don’t need an accounting degree. You need someone to show you the game.

Chinmay Ananda presenting to a full conference room

The shift

AI changed who does the work.
It didn’t change who makes the decision.

In medicine

Then

Doctors measured blood pressure by hand

Later

Nurses took the readings for them

Now

A machine does it in seconds

One thing never changed

The doctor still decides the treatment.

In business

Then

Owners crunched the numbers by hand

Later

Bookkeepers and accountants took over

Now

Software and AI do it in seconds

One thing never changed

The leader still makes the decision.

The machine reads your blood pressure. The doctor chooses the medication.

AI reads your numbers. You choose the decision.

Knowing what to ask, what it means, and what to do: that’s Financial Decision Intelligence.

It’s the edge that gets leaders heard, trusted and promoted. And it’s the only thing we teach.

“An amateur who knows how to use AI can outperform an expert who doesn’t.
The winner was never the machine, it was the human who knew how to use it.”
— The Kasparov Principle

The method

Why this isn’t another finance course.

Courses give you knowledge. This builds a skill, and every skill needs practice. That’s exactly what the simulators are for.

01

Stories, not jargon

A financial report is just a scoreboard telling you whether you’re winning.
Once that clicks, the numbers stop being scary and start being useful.

02

Simulators, not slides

You don’t learn to ride a bike from a lecture. You learn by riding it.
In 70 decision simulators you set the price, make the hire, take the loan, and watch the money respond. Safely, before it’s real.

03

Decisions, not theory

No debits, no credits, no memorising definitions.
Every lesson ends in the same place: a better decision on pricing, hiring, cash and growth.

Feel it for yourself

Make a real decision. Watch the money respond.

Three decisions. Three sets of levers. The numbers react to you, that feeling is how the skill is built.

Decision 1 of 3

Can your café survive this month?

Imagine you own a café. Let’s find out what it takes to break even this month, just by selling coffee:

Average selling price: $5.00 a cup
Average cost of making a cup: $2.50
Fixed costs (rent, wages, utility bills): $10,000 a month

Selling price per cup: $5.00 Cost of making a cup: $2.50 Fixed costs (rent, wages, utility bills): $10,000 How many cups do you think you’ll sell? 0

4,000your target: cups to break even / month

0 / 134cups a day · yours vs needed

$2.50you keep, per cup (contribution)

–$10,000your month, at your guess

These are 3 of the 70 decision simulators inside the programs · explore the simulators →

The instrument

1 + 1 is never equal to 2.

That was the greatest lesson from six failed startups. We make plans, and life edits them. Sometimes 1 + 1 turns out to be 1.5. Sometimes −1. Occasionally 3.

“If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.”
— Woody Allen

So the real question was never the plan. It was: when 1 + 1 refuses to be 2, do you have a Plan B and a Plan C in the pipeline?

Broadly, every decision-maker fits one of three patterns.

👇 Click the pattern that sounds like you, and watch where it places you on the maturity model.

where this pattern lives

Tap a pattern above to see where it sits on the 7-dimension, 5-stage maturity model.

“In God we trust; all others must bring data.”
— attributed to W. Edwards Deming

Take the assessment, see exactly which stage you’re in

Free · 5 minutes · you’ll get your profile across all seven dimensions.

Your path

Knowledge is watching. Skill is doing.

Videos and e-books will make you more informed about finance. But decision-making is a skill, and a skill is built the way confidence is built: practising decisions in the simulators, then bringing your real questions to a live webinar every week. That is the road to Stage 5, Navigator.

Start here · $27

Business Finance Essentials

Taste the teaching style and get your first win: the program, 5 decision simulators, 10 eBooks and 12 live webinars with Chinmay. One month. No risk.

You’ll know the language.

Read more →

The Navigator path · $397

The Cohort

Become the person in the room who can understand, challenge, and make financially sound decisions. Six weeks, live: the full 36-video program, all 70 simulators to practise on, weekly live webinars where you bring your real questions, the AI finance co-pilot dashboard, 50 eBooks, and a community that speaks the language.

You’ll own the skill. This is where Navigators are made.

See what’s inside →

For organisations

In-House Program

AI-driven financial decision-making for your management team: capability assessment, live workshops, simulators and an organisational maturity map. Customised, priced on a call.

Your whole team, fluent in the numbers.

Read more →

Information is everywhere. Reps are rare. The Cohort gives you the reps: a decision practised, a question answered, a level gained, every single week.

The founder · Chinmay Ananda

A non-accountant who teaches finance. On purpose.

Proud owner of six failed businesses. They remain his best teachers.
Since 2014, has trained 15,000+ people across Australia, India, China and Indonesia.
Conducted groundbreaking research on the common business finance mistakes, delivered as a keynote speaker at the Australian Taxation Office, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, CPA Australia and many other industry forums.
Developed finance programs for Executive MBA students in five universities.
Former National Treasurer, Professional Speakers Australia.
Author of two books: FUNdamentals of Financial Statements and The Bottomline.

His teaching philosophy

Finance + Storytelling = meaningful conversations
Finance − Storytelling = data without meaning
Storytelling − Finance = emotion without logic
No finance, no story = no strategy

“Making money is simple.
Spending money is easy.
But simple is not always easy.”
— Chinmay Ananda

Meet Chinmay

Testimonials

People don’t remember the course.
They remember the moment it clicked.

“I couldn’t recommend this program enough for a simple jargon-free interpretation of finance and how to run your organisation a lot better. If you have this knowledge you will have it for life.”

Louise LucasCEO, The Property Education Company, Melbourne

“He masterfully mixed stories, plain English explanations, and relevant activities to awaken our minds to being a smarter finance person.”

Helen PalmerDirector, RHX Group, Melbourne

“Chinmay’s program has really helped me to understand finances better to actually make me a better business person.”

James SmithCEO, Smith Brothers Media, Australia

“You provided a new way of viewing the numbers with real-world examples. Recently, I’ve been promoted to our Senior Leadership team to help bridge the operations side with the board and finance teams. The knowledge you imparted was a big part of that success.”

Jamie SlusherDirector of Client Project Management, USA

“I’ve been running my business for 20 years. I found the program incredibly rewarding and helpful. The clarity I got about financial statements was fantastic.”

Greg RhodesManaging Director, Advance Anti-Slip Surfaces, Melbourne

“Business is simple. There are lot of consultants who try to make it complicated but Chinmay makes it easy for an average business owner to understand their numbers and make informed decisions.”

Martin BaileyDirector, Business Networking Strategies, Melbourne

“Chinmay takes a very complicated subject (finance) which most business people struggle with. He really breaks it down and makes it crystal clear.”

Paul O’SheaManaging Director, CS Town Planning Pty Ltd, Melbourne

“Chinmay really hits the nail on the head in terms of helping business owners to understand finances.”

Shay WhithamFounder, Melbourne Painting Company

“A must program for anyone starting or managing a business.”

Peter GrayGeneral Manager, Genlux Pty Ltd, Melbourne

“Finance Academy made finance simple, practical, and accessible. As someone who never considered myself a ‘numbers person,’ I gained the confidence to understand my business finances and have meaningful conversations with my accountant.”

Tahlia ReynoldsDigital Creator, Melbourne

“Overall, excellent presentation, online materials, accessible references, and a structured course with real-life experiences. The level of professionalism, knowledge & patience you consistently demonstrated was astounding.”

Saul RamirezSenior IT Project Manager, NorthGate Markets, USA

More results, all 27 stories →

The numbers aren’t going to explain themselves.

5 minutes. Seven dimensions. One honest picture of where you stand, and exactly what to build next.

Take the Assessment Or start with Essentials