Jennifer Warawa
In the past decade, the role of the accountant has drastically evolved. As technology continues to improve and automate traditional accounting tasks, accountants today are moving away from crunching numbers and auditing financial statements to providing more strategic advisory services. This is largely due to the rising expectations of accounting firms’ clients—in fact, Sage’s 2018 Practice of Now report found 83 percent of accounting clients are demanding more from accountants than five years ago, and 42 percent expect guidance from accountants regarding business strategy. From business decision making and growth planning, to providing insights on vertical industry trends, the modern day accountant must have broader expertise than ever before in order to meet the heightened demands of their clients.
While these new client expectations may seem daunting, they also create a remarkable opportunity for today’s accountants to expand their knowledge and provide more value to their customers. By leveraging new technology, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, accountants can address their clients’ new needs, and gain an edge over their competition. Here’s how:
Evolving Beyond the Books
Until now, many accountants were overlooked as one-trick executors instead of internal financial strategists. Today’s business leaders understand that decision-making is driven by numbers, as the majority of CEOs say their main priority for 2018 is strategic and measurable company growth. In turn, companies are leaning more and more on their accountants for this numerical data. With visibility into key insights like profitability, losses and operational expenditures, accountants are privy to a holistic view of a business, making them ideal sources for effective, data-driven growth strategies.
Due to this unique, complete perspective into the business, accounting professionals are in a stronger and more valued position than ever before. The new, elevated role of accountants is essential to a company’s growth, as more and more business executives turn to their accountants for data-backed opinions around new market expansion, risk analysis with product launches, and identifying infrastructural problem-areas within a company.
Leveraging New Solutions Today to Prepare for Tomorrow
However, given the sheer number of administrative tasks accountants are typically faced with on a daily basis, it can seem impossible to make time for a more strategic role. In fact, administrative work accounts for nearly a billion dollars daily in lost productivity, with time spent on monotonous tasks like data entry and compiling invoices. As clients begin to expect more from accountants, practitioners will need to devote more time to high level strategy work, and less time to day-to-day administrative tasks. Fortunately, to help meet these evolving client needs, accountants can leverage new technology to automate time-consuming tasks and ultimately, free up time for more valuable strategy work.
Critical solutions such as automated invoicing and payments, or cloud accounting technology enable staff to work seamlessly and quickly, no matter their location. This is especially important as remote working is becoming a common practice across industries. Cloud-enabled mobility allows accounting teams to collaborate on reports in real time, across devices, avoiding unnecessary duplicate work and increasing overall productivity—whether it’s from a coffee shop or the corner office. The right technology can significantly reduce time spent on administrative work, empowering staff to use their newfound availability to carry out more creative asks that will bolster a business’ bottom line.
Embracing Augmented Accountancy
We’ve seen many accountants who have already significantly changed how they approach their client services, utilizing cloud technology to address issues on-the-go, and going beyond the books to serve as trusted business advisors and strategists. Now, the question is “what next?” A recent report by Sage shows accountants today see artificial intelligence (AI) as the answer. In fact, Sage found that half of accountants worldwide want to utilize AI to automate the routine tasks, such as number crunching, data entry, email and diary management. I predict that, in the next few years, accountants will continue to recognize the value of AI as a tool to help with tasks even beyond tedious administrative. For example, AI-powered machine learning tools will be able to predict a client’s cash flow based on the company’s previous behavior. Using a business’s proprietary data, AI will be able to make predictions and decisions—giving accountants more time and mental energy to focus on larger scale client needs and relationships.
However, in order to spur widespread technology adoption in the accounting profession, accountants and their firms must provide some initial investment and education, especially given only 39 percent of accountants describe themselves as early technology adopters. Yet with an eye on the future, these investments in money and time can yield incredibly valuable results further down the line. Newly skilled accountants, backed by the latest technology, will be better prepared to transition into a world beyond balancing books and filling out forms into one that offers the chance to help drive a business’s future.
Preparing for change
Much like the business world as a whole, the accounting profession is changing rapidly. The accountants that are willing to embrace and take on a broader range of tasks and learn new skills will not only witness a more efficient way to work, but also improved relationships with their clients. It is time for businesses to view accountants as less of a service provider, and more as a strategic business partner. New technology serves as an excellent catalyst for this change, providing the tools needed to free accountants from tedious administrative work, enabling them to focus on the work that will truly move the needle. The accountants and organizations willing to embrace this shift in the industry will be at the forefront of future business leadership, while those that resist it risk being left behind.