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MYOB has warned accountants that artificial intelligence (AI) is set to transform the profession, with quality of business advice likely to improve dramatically.
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Artificial intelligence set to hit accounting, warns MYOB
21 September 2015
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Speaking to AccountantsDaily, Simon Raik-Allen, MYOB chief technology officer, said artificial intelligence is currently being deployed widely behind the scenes and will soon start to affect accountants – but in a very positive way.
According to Mr Raik-Allen, businesses have significant interaction both with their immediate business environment and with the landscape created by wider economic conditions. For an accountant to give the best advice, they need to get their head around that.
“What artificial intelligence has the power to do is to really analyse, gather, filter and start to automate the collection of that data and really provide the accountant with information summarised about the environment,” he said.
“There could be some economic conditions overseas or something going on in the world and the AI could advise the accountant of this event and therefore the accountant could give better advice to their client.”
According to Mr Raik-Allen, accountants of the future will start deploying many artificial algorithms in various places to start helping them with how they give advice.
"I think that’s a really big opportunity to really improve the service,” he said.
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Mr Raik-Allen said he expects the effects of artificial intelligence will really start to kick in over the next five years as more businesses move online. This will be good for the industry and provide accountants who are ready to adapt with the opportunity to build better client relationships.
“People are going to start to want the human experience,” he said.
“Now is a good time to start to prepare yourself for that future and think about the services you offer. What’s the human touch point of that?
“Accountants have lots of touch points with their customers and they really cherish those touch points,” Mr Raik-Allen said. "I think that as technology starts to automate a lot of that, it’s really important for accountants to think about creating and keeping and maintaining and improving those experience points and the human factor in how they work with customers."
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