Frequently Asked Questions

We have a range of subscriptions for members who may want to join us.

Our base Subscription gives you the choice of joining us on a rolling monthly basis, or committing to a year with us.

This will give you access to our community platform, all of our on-demand training content, our live, virtual events, and our incredible global community of Full Stack members.

Our annual Bootcamp subscription gives you 12 months' access to all of the benefits listed above for the base subscription, plus free access to the various public bootcamps we run (Excel Fundamentals, Month End Automation, AFM Exam Preparation). These bootcamps are charged separately to the general public or those on a base subscription.

The FMI Pro subscription gives you all of the benefits listed above for the Bootcamp subscription, plus a sitting with the Financial Modeling Institute (FMI) for either their AFM or CFM certification exam.

We do also have a lifetime membership option. Please reach out to us if you'd like to learn more about this.

Every once in a while we will offer a discount for one or more subscription type, but this is not common and not scheduled in any sort of cycle.

We do offer some discounts for team bookings depending on the scope and scale of the training requested.

Please contact Giles at giles@fullstackmodeller.com to find out more about our group booking process.

The accreditation process tests the most important aspects of our technical training content. Members are assessed through the successful completion of key case studies at each level of the Full Stack programme. 

At the end of each of our core course levels: Excel Mastery, Advanced Financial Modelling, Data Viz & Analytics, you will be guided to the accreditation platform and gain access to the case study files and data needed to complete each case.

You get direct, one-to-one feedback for your submissions at each level of accreditation. If you fall below the standard we set for each level, we'll help you improve before your next attempt.

No - the subscription cost is for an individual member. There are group booking discounts available for companies seeking to enroll multiple people into our training programme.

Our base Subscription does give you the chance to join month by month to see if you like what we offer.

Beyond that, we think of ourselves as more than just an online training course provider. We are building a community of finance professionals who want to engage with others and are prepared to take the time to develop themselves in a meaningful way. So we believe twelve months is about the right length of time for our new members to settle in, connect with others, work through all of the content and gain Full Stack accreditation.

If you are genuinely looking for a quick fix on a particular element of modelling knowledge, you might want to keep an eye on our public bootcamps. We run these through a platform called Maven.com, and it's our intention to build a handful of these which we run throughout the year. Here's a link to our Month End Excel Automation bootcamp. Here's a link to our FMI AFM Exam Prep bootcamp.

If you do that, firstly – well done!

If you're on the rolling monthly Subscription then you are welcome to just stop there and move on. If you're on an annual subscription, we’d like to see you engage with the community even more if you manage to finish early. You would essentially be seen as an expert / experienced modeller within the group, and that means there will be lots of members on their journey who could learn a lot from you.

We’re open to our members coming to us with suggestions for content, challenges, events, and more. 

“Renewing” probably isn’t the right term for what happens at the end of the initial twelve-month membership period.

You are choosing to remain a part of an incredible community; one that will only grow and evolve over time. This gives you ongoing access to an amazing group of modellers from all corners of the world, and continued access to all of our live events – essentially keeping you up to date with the latest updates in the industry year after year.

We are always updating our content, so you will also benefit from our latest courses, events and resources if you stay with us for longer. 

Yes! 

We'd actually argue that beginners are primed to take the most value from our content, which starts off covering the very basics of Excel (more experienced modellers are guided to skip over the early modules if they're comfortable with the topics covered already).

The truth is that the vast majority of Excel users are still beginners, most of whom have had no formal training. So if you're in that camp, you're not alone and you're very welcome.

Honestly just wait until you hear some of Giles’ questions!

We run our business and our community with two key underlying principles: honesty and teamwork. Nobody will expect you to suddenly transform into a Excel Jedi, and no question will be too basic for our group.

Our more experienced members are challenged to be supportive leaders, and our less experienced members are encouraged to be vocal and open with their thoughts, ideas, and questions.

We are all about engagement. The more we talk and share with each other, the more we all stand to gain from this.

You can expect to have the following technical skills:

Excel fundamentals including functions, shortcuts and navigation skills, Excel Tables, Pivot Tables and Charting, Power Query, Modelling Standards and general best-practice modelling principles, actuals + forecast modelling

Advanced financial modelling including three statement modelling, valuations modelling, debt and equity financing and scenario modelling.

Data visualisation and analytics skills.  We'll help you understand how to effectively share the insights of your analysis with your stakeholders - a vital part of a modellers skills set, and one which is quite often missing. 

Yes - we just can't promise to be available for one-to-one support all the time. You will have a huge amount of engagement with us as a team, and we have regular check-in sessions at all levels of training as part of our live event series. One of the Full Stack team will be able to answer specific modelling questions for you if you post them on the platform, just as any other member of the community could.

Not at all. If you want to become an accredited member by the end of your initial membership then you will have to successfully complete the key case studies at each of our three core levels: 1) Excel Mastery, 2) Advanced Financial Modelling, 3) Data Viz & Analytics. But the time it takes you to complete those steps is completely within your control.

If you do want to continue working towards your accreditation and remain a part of the community then you can choose to extend your membership by renewing your subscription.

However, accreditation is not obligatory. You are equally free to call it a day whenever your monthly or annual subscription comes to an end (hopefully having learned an enormous amount even if you have not gained that accreditation certificate!)

The only assessments are case studies at each level of the content journey for our members who do choose to complete the accreditation process.

So you do have to prove your modelling skills as part of that process, but the bulk of our offering is on-demand course content which you just work through in your own time.

The core training journey content is delivered through pre-recorded videos, with supporting exercises and case studies. Access to all content is given to members when they join us.

Live events and community engagement facilitated by the Full Stack team are there to add even more avenues for members to learn as they progress through their membership period. Live events will often include specialist trainers and guest speakers who we will have brought in specifically to teach our members on a particular subject area. We want the best of the best for our Full Stack community.

Live events take place almost every week of the year. You are not obligated to attend any (attendance is not part of your accreditation assessment), and most sessions are recorded and available to watch back in your own time.

Although we recommend going through each lesson regardless, it is certainly not an obligation and you are free to skip modules if you believe you are comfortable with the skills being taught already.

Training videos and live session recordings are not available for download. They are available on our bespoke platform as long as you have an active subscription (all you need is an internet connection).

This is almost impossible to answer because we have members with such varied levels of experience.

For inexperienced modellers, please assume that it will take roughly half a day a week to gain accreditation within a twelve-month period.

However, we typically see members dipping in and out throughout the year as other work commitments and life take over. This is absolutely fine, and we understand most people have busy periods and less busy periods. Do what you can, when you can, and we'll do our best to support you.

FMI is similar to Full Stack in some respects, and different in others. FMI run a three-level certification programme with live, proctored exams scheduled at certain points throughout the year. They also have a community platform for people signed up to take their exams.

Full Stack is a broad training programme covering Excel, financial modelling, data visualisation & analytics, with a community of modellers from all over the world, and access to weekly live events delivered by our team and external experts.

To be very clear, we really love what the FMI offer. We are an accredited training provider for the FMI, and our Advanced Financial Modelling course is specifically tailored to get people ready to pass the FMI's AFM exam.

Our best suggestion if you're looking at both organisations is to consider our FMI Pro subscription which you'll find in the Training dropdown menu here on our website (it includes both an annual Full Stack Modeller subscription and an FMI exam sitting all wrapped up together).

You will be sick of our voices and faces by the end of the year….

Seriously, you’ll have lots of contact with us. This really is more than a set of recorded videos. This is our passion project and we love being involved in the community. If you attend enough live events, you’ll see us very regularly indeed (we’ll leave you to judge whether that’s a good or a bad thing).

Coding languages are not a core element of our training journey, and Python and C++ are not covered at all.