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Shaped by business. Informed by managers
Founded by people who understand both sides of the challenge. Informed by business leaders, shaped by managers and delivered by expert practitioners.
Founded by people who understand both sides of the challenge. Informed by business leaders, shaped by managers and delivered by expert practitioners.
For years, business owners and senior leaders across Western Australia kept running into the same problem. They were promoting capable people into management, but those managers lacked the commercial grounding to perform at the next level. Technical strength got people into the role. It rarely prepared them to lead a team, read a business, or contribute beyond their function. The result was a layer of management that could execute well but couldn't yet think commercially.
● Managers were promoted for technical or operational strength, not developed for commercial thinking.
● Without that grounding, decisions kept escalating to owners and executives by default.
● Most training delivered content once and offered no way to reinforce it on the job.
Founder and Managing Director
Rupen Kotecha is the Founder and Managing Director of The Manager Academy, and has spent over a decade building and leading WA Leaders and the Business Owners Boardroom. Through both organisations, he has built deep connections with business owners, founders, directors, and senior leaders across Western Australia.
Through those relationships, one challenge kept surfacing. Organisations were promoting capable people into management, but those managers often lacked the commercial grounding to succeed at the next level. As an entrepreneur and business owner himself, Rupen created The Manager Academy to bridge that gap. His perspective comes from the owner's seat, not the training room.
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Co-Founder and Program Director
Dan Greco is the Co-Founder and Program Director of The Manager Academy, bringing extensive commercial leadership experience and a practical understanding of what it takes to succeed beyond a functional management role. With a background in senior commercial account management, Dan helps managers develop the commercial awareness, strategic thinking, executive communication and decision-making skills needed to create real value within a business.
As Co-Founder, Dan played a key role in developing The Manager Academy, working directly with managers across a range of industries to identify where they felt least prepared and most commercially underconfident. The curriculum was built around those real-world insights, ensuring every module reflects the challenges managers actually face, rather than assumptions about what they should know.
The Manager Academy was built from both sides of the management equation. Rupen brings the perspective of business owners, founders, directors, and executives. Dan brings the lived experience of commercial management and professional development.
Together, they built a program that reflects what business leaders need from their managers, and what managers need to step up and deliver it.
Walk into a workshop with a question. Leave with a framework you can use.
Learn from practitioners who've made the commercial calls, not academics who've studied them.
Get real examples from real businesses, not textbook scenarios.
Revisit every session recording when a real situation demands it, not just when it's convenient.
Build a toolkit that works on actual problems, not hypothetical ones.
● Apply what you learned before the next session starts.
Bring the problem you've been avoiding. Leave with a decision you'll actually make.
Watch someone in a completely different industry solve the exact pressure you're under.
Stop rehearsing the call in your head. Make it.
Take what you learned last session and use it on something with real money on the line.
Talk the way the room above you already expects you to talk.
Walk back into your team running the method yourself, not waiting to be told.
The Manager Academy continues to evolve through monthly participant feedback, conversations with business owners and senior leaders, insights from experts and issues arising in real workplaces.
Through ongoing conversations with business owners, founders and senior leaders, we hear directly what they need from their management layer: commercial judgement, the ability to make decisions independently, and a clearer line of sight to what drives the business.
Through direct interviews and ongoing feedback from managers themselves, we hear exactly where they feel underprepared, whether that's reading the numbers, communicating with executives, or making a call without checking in first. That input shapes how it's taught.
Tell us what's happening in your business and what you're trying to fix. We'll be direct about whether the program is the right fit and what to expect.
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