Ep: 90 Top experts answer: "What, if anything, will significantly change accounting in the next few years?"
The Accounting Answers Podcast, hosted by Rob Brown, asks critical questions of the experts, leaders and influencers who shape the decision-making of accountants, CPAs and finance professionals. Today we ask:
What, if anything, will significantly change accounting in the next few years?
You'll hear insightful and passionate answers from these 5 experts and influencers:
Arun Mehra | CEO of Samera Global, helping accountants build a global firm
Ashley Leeds | 15 minute guy teaching LinkedIn in 15 Minutes a Day
Becky Glover | Award winning Finance Director, board member and business leader
Ben Richmond | Chartered accountant and U.S. country manager at Xero
Blake Oliver | Founder of Earmark, where accountants earn CPE for podcasts
Tune into more on this daily show for short, sharp episodes that keep you informed of what's happening in the accounting world and the whole ecosystem of consultants, organizations, vendors and advisors who serve them.
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Hi I'm Rob Brown and welcome you accounting finance professionals tech enthusiasts to the Accounting Answers podcast. We've embarked on a captivating exploration of the future of accounting and its profound connection to the ever changing technology ecosystem. Think for a moment how access to the minds of a range of accounting experts, influencers, vendors and leaders would keep you super informed about what's going on in this wonderful profession. You'd stay relevant and future focused. You'd make better strategic and career decisions. If you know what forces are in play and what factors are driving change, to unravel complexities and unveil the future of accounting have personally interviewed 111 leading accounting professionals tech leaders and industry influencers each bring in their unique expertise and insights to the table and together we'll delve into the five critical questions that will shape the accounting world. Through the eyes and minds of people living the accounting life I'll talk into accountants every day. We'll talk about five critical topics that ignite in passion debates and stimulate minds across the globe. We'll map in the transformative trajectory of the accounting profession and its symbiotic relationship with the technological revolution. We'll be asking about the next gen accountants, how far down the advisory line firms are, what's going to change the accounting world, what the software vendors and tech providers could do better to serve accountants and whilst coming up in the future. Let's get straight into the answers for today's topic. We've been focusing this week on the question what significant changes are on the horizon for the accounting profession in coming years. Getting future focused is top of the agenda for accounting firms, professional associations, societies governing bodies who all shape the reputation of the profession. So let's get ahead of these disruptive forces as another five of our 111 accounting influencers and experts share their very best analysis. Sharing the thoughts now is Arun Mira CEO of Semira Global dedicated to helping accountants build and scale their firms on a global scale with strategic advice and insights into international markets. I think there are two main things that will change accounting the next two years. First is AI and tech, which I'll come on to in a second and a second and the second is resourcing. Now, if we look at AI and tech, we've all seen in 2023 the launch of chat GPT and the wonders that it has and everyone talking about it's going to change the world. In the accounting world, we're not too sure exactly how and what. But if you just see how it's developing the rate of pace it's developing, I'm pretty sure we'll be at a point in the next few years where literally bookkeeping will be automated to an even greater degree. Financial accounts will be prepared automatically. Tax returns will be prepared automatically from all this data that's coming from invoice information. Now, the key thing here will have to be training team members, will be having to train clients as well. If we can get over that barrier, which I think we will do, but it won't happen immediately. I think it's like over the next five or 10 years, I think we'll see accounting change significantly where technology takes over everything. However, the other point, number point two is resource. We need to think about, if you look at the UK market, look at the US market, accountants are retiring, less people are coming into accounting because they don't see it as a, as I suppose, an exciting career or a stable career. They gain the IT marketing or something else, okay, even AI type types of jobs. So I think resourcing will be an issue. Now, if AI taking over some of the jobs, which you will certainly, but we'll still need accountants, we'll still need accountants to put their mark on the piece of paper to review information, to add value to clients to advise. So I think the skill set of the accountant will be really important. And therefore, I think the communication skills of these accountants will be important. Whether those accountants are sitting here in the UK or whether sitting overseas or offshore, the resourcing will be really important to get right. And that means we have to train these people, whether they're sitting in London or sitting in Delhi, whatever they make, we have to train them to a standard, which meets the requirements of what the clients need. Next, we welcome Ashley Leeds, known as the 50 minute guy teaching professors how to leverage LinkedIn effectively in just 50 minutes a day to grow their network and business opportunities. It is AI. I'm sorry to keep banging on about AI because this is going to come in and change everything that they're doing. We've seen open banking and that's going to improve as well. There's an awful lot of things that we do in an accountancy practice that is just sausage machine, you know, sausage factory machine sort of stuff. And we can use these tools to really, really help us get to the nitty gritty and really help our clients. I think clients are being being more discerning now. They want more help. They don't just want the compliance done. They want someone to hold their hand. They want someone to put them in the right direction. And with all these tools talking to each other, we're going to have a much better environment to help our small business owners. Next, we hear the perspective of Becky Glover and it would win in finance director, board member and business leader renowned for her strategic financial leadership and commitment to driving business success. Yeah, I think there's a huge thing that's going to change and has started to change. And that is the perception of accountants. So it used to be that accountants were back office function or lumped in with part of the admin side of a business. But now they're becoming business partners with the shareholders, the directors, the real ownership of the business. So what is moving forwards isn't just technology. It's us and how we're perceived in that business as well. So we are now the key people in that business to help move that business forwards. So we're moving strong back office to front office. Next, please welcome Ben Richmond, a chartered accountant and US country manager at zero where he leads initiatives to empower small businesses and accountants with innovative cloud based accounting software. Yeah, I think the demands from the customers are now starting to rapidly change. And I think, you know, after a decade of cheap money and high growth, it's been a lot easier on them now. It's now it's more scary and now it's more volatile. So the profession, I think we need to rebrand. I think we need to think about what should we stand for? How do we want to be perceived by our customers? We should do that together. We should engage the next generation. And I think that rebrand is going to be critical. And those that don't come on that journey are going to really struggle. I think the second thing is the true advantage for us as advisors is the human ally. So AI is coming. It's right now, there's a lot of glitzy glammy stuff out there with AI, like any technology that glitzy glamour stuff is going to be into being really powerful tools for making work flow processing faster in sites we get faster. But have confidence that as advisors, there is context we have that AI can't possibly not. And so investing in soft skills, focusing on things like emotional intelligence is going to be critical, because that's the level of advice you can provide beyond, you know, yes, you're going to have to be better at analysing data. But the machine's going to be pretty good with AI. But you'll be the one that knows the client and depth of the machine can't. You might know that they're going through a merit separation. You might not. They've got some challenges of succession with the children. And that allows you to put context around the advice that the machine can't. So the human element is your advantage. So make sure you're developing that and investing in that. And we talk compliance, probably the fit. It's going to continue to be a massive task, particularly here in the US. Like it's, I often have people say compliance is dead. It's all advisory. I sort of call bullshit on that. It's it's still a massive part of our practices. And years it's getting simpler. But don't think about them as separate. Advisory and compliance are really like the infinity wheel. If you're engaging with your client regularly, you're doing work for them on the go. You're going to make a much more efficient compliance tax season and a much more stickier client. And you're going to see those moments through being connected, where you can help sell in more services. And it's going to help you become more focused. And that work is way more engaging as you look to solve the talent thing. So don't see compliance as advisory. It's going to become really it's going to become integrated advisor in the next few years. It already is diving into the conversation. Now is Blake Oliver, founder of EMR, where accountants and CPE for listening to podcasts, blending education with entertainment to support the accounting professions continuous learning. Obviously, it's going to be AI. I use chat, CPT, Claude, Bard, Grammarly is one other I can't remember on almost a daily basis now. And I think that all accountants are going to be doing that in in the surveys that I've done informally at conferences on webinars. I would say about 20% of accountants have tried these AI chatbots as of the beginning of 2024 or the end of 2023, it's going to go to 100% and we're going to be using it every single day. And I find that in terms of supporting my own decisions, it's a game changer. When I need to answer questions like this, I pose them to chat TPT to brainstorm potential responses or to think about what am I missing? And for people who work from home, which I do, it's fantastic to have that sounding board right there on a second screen or a third screen. And I feel like I've got it's not really an advisor, but I've got somebody who is I can I can toss ideas at and get responses. And it just makes me better. It makes me less likely to miss things and so much faster. So I'm really bullish just from a practical numbers perspective. Open AI, the company that created chat TPT says that we can automate about 15% of all tasks today with chatbots. So like right now today, with chat TPT, about 15% of the work of an average white collar professional could be automated with AI. I've seen that myself. I feel definitely that's happening, you know, automating about an hour or two of my work every day. As those AI tools get integrated into the apps we use into tax software, accounting software, project management software, that's going to rise to about 50%. So just imagine a world in which 50% of all the tasks that we do as accountants are automated. Hopefully that gives us more time in our schedules so we're not so busy. And hopefully it allows us to do more to streamline and really focus on connecting all the pipes that get us the data that we need to make decisions and spending less time just putting it together every month. So the accountants who embrace this tech are going to be twice as productive or more. Those that don't are going to keep on the status quo. And they're simply going to be at a competitive disadvantage. And I see this today with firm owners who are in their 60s who are looking to exit. They don't have an exit because they can't attract the young talent because the young talent doesn't want to grind on old tools and old tech. They want the latest tools and they don't want to work as many hours. So just from a practical perspective, if you want to have a succession plan in your firm, if you want to have an exit, which I hope we all do, we all do want to retire at some point, you have to use these tools. And if you don't, you're going to sell your firm at a pretty significant discount, you know, pennies on the dollar. So make the effort now, embrace the new tech, give it to your young people, and it'll be a bright future. So there you have five great answers to the question, what if anything will significantly change accounting in the next few years? Every work in depth, a week Monday through Friday, we give you the insights of five top influencers in the accounting world on this critical area of what is coming up change wise for accountants. That's 25 valuable perspectives, viewpoints and best thinking every week. And with a fresh week comes a fresh question and more thoughts from the best influencers and leaders we can find in the accounting world. Thanks for listening to the Accounting Answers podcast and sharing this brand new show with your friends and colleagues. If you want to join the conversation, you can plug into our community of influencers at accountinginfluencers.com and check out our virtual speed networking events. These happen every few months for the North American region and the UK Europe region. These are great opportunities to raise your profile, build valuable connections and share your thoughts with influential peers. Until next time, this is your host Rob Brown saying stay informed, stay relevant and stay connected.
