Building an AI-ready company: Strategies for integration
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to As an accountant, how do you start building an AI-ready company? Let’s take a look at AI’s impact on the accounting profession, how to cultivate an AI-savvy culture, and best practices for developing an AI roadmap that supports growth and innovation responsibly.
Understanding AI’s impactThere is no doubt that AI is poised to transform the tax and accounting career landscape by unleashing operational efficiencies never before seen. According to the Thomson Reuters Future of Professionals Report respondents predicted that AI would free up as much time as four hours a day within the next 12 months. AI can handle large amounts of data, improve response time, and reduce human errors. AI-powered tax search can also help staff find more targeted results in less time. By providing professionally summarized answers, complete with citation links to relevant editorial content and source materials, even junior staff can quickly answer complex client questions with confidence.
Step 1: Cultivating an AI-savvy culture
While the benefits of AI are clear, putting this technology into practice requires a holistic approach. Fostering a workplace environment that embraces continuous learning and adaptation to new technologies ensures that your staff is prepared to leverage AI tools effectively.
As evidenced in the 2024 State of the Tax Professionals Report, recruiting and retaining new professionals is a top priority given the shortage of tax and accounting talent and a shrinking labor pool. AI must also align with the business goals of your accounting firm. AI should not be adopted for its own sake but with clear objectives like improving efficiency, enhancing client service, and driving growth.
It’s equally as important to invest time and resources into upskilling your staff with AI-related training programs, webinars, and workshops to improve their understanding of AI tools and their applications.
Most importantly, however, is that nothing beats practical, hands-on learning. You can encourage your staff to learn by allowing them to use AI-powered audit suites or tax research tools. And you can rest easy knowing that professional-grade tax research solutions (as opposed to publicly available platforms ) are backed by the security measures necessary for the tax and accounting profession.
Step 2: Developing an AI roadmap
According to the Future of Professionals Report, 77% of respondents believe AI will have a transformational or high impact in the next five years, with an average of 56% of all professionals’ work set to use new AI-powered technologies in five years.
While the future of AI in tax research is certainly promising, it’s important to understand the benefits and challenges to successfully harness the power of AI for a competitive edge.
To build an effective AI roadmap, consider the following steps:
Pilot smaller AI projects in specific areas within the firm.
Gather insights and refine processes before taking it firm-wide.
Consider engaging with clients by explaining how AI tools help provide faster, more accurate, and personalized services. This can also open the door to additional revenue streams, like advisory services.
Remember: Transparency builds trust–and a forward-thinking AI approach can become your firm’s competitive edge.
Step 3: Implementing AI responsibly
Despite the clear benefits, the adoption of AI brings with it ethical considerations and the need for standards that ensure it is used responsibly.
Publicly available generative AI platforms pull data from across the internet. It is possible that the answers are inaccurate, outdated, or simply unverified. This can lead to accuracy, privacy, and security concerns, not to mention the possible financial impacts and reputational damage that can come with unvetted tax research.
- However, an industry-specific AI-powered tax research platform enables your firm to implement AI responsibility, eliminating concerns over accuracy and data security.
- Are you ready to become an AI-ready firm?
- Checkpoint Edge with CoCounsel is an industry-specific, professional grade, GenAI assistant built specifically for tax and accounting professionals.
With a conversational interface, it delivers straightforward answers to even your most challenging questions – just as if you were speaking directly to a subject matter expert or trusted advisor.
