What you learn:
- AI amplifies accounting experience: In accountant research, the most experienced AI was used strategically to promote improved performance.
- Both productivity and reporting quality are improved with AI. Using AI-enabled software has helped accountants support more clients and complete monthly statements faster.
- Expertise is still important: Evaluating AI's work requires human judgment and avoids errors.
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New research confirms that some accountants may already know. Generic artificial intelligence software makes them more productive and often improves the quality of reports.
Assistant Professor MIT Sloan Along with Stanford's John Hoshui, we can partner with companies that manufacture AI-based accounting software to analyze hundreds of thousands of transaction entries from 79 small businesses. They also surveyed 277 accountants, with about 10% of them using AI in their daily lives. Another 10% had no experiments with AI at all.
The majority of accountants surveyed felt that AI provided efficient benefits and that Xie and Choi wrote, “it could reduce repetitive work and improve analysis.” And the majority felt that it would increase job satisfaction as it was related to productivity, work-life balance and career. This study occurred early in the research of generative AI and accounting, but the findings suggest practical implications for accountants, managers and accounting firms.
Clear productivity and quality improvements
This research software automates daily tasks and helps accountants make decisions. For example, you can classify transactions, summarise contracts, and detect bookkeeping anomalies. Accountants using software SAW Increased productivity On average, include:
- Increased weekly client support.
- “Reallocation of approximately 8.5% of accountant time From routine data entry to high value tasks Business communication, quality assurance, etc.,” the researcher wrote.
I also saw those same accountants. Improved financial reporting quality; Please look:
- 12% increase in general ledger granularity (a measure of reporting details).
- A reduction in monthly closing price by 7.5 days.
“Essentially, companies employing AI can complete their monthly financial statements within almost two weeks of the end of the month, while others take more than a week,” writes Xie and Choi.
Researchers have discovered that many accountants use the tool to handle everyday tasks, free up time for analysis, and work with clients. They also said, “More experienced accountants tend to use AI systems more strategically And then you will enjoy greater performance improvements. ” An experienced accountant writes that AI software may be better at interpreting trust scores applied to unique recommendations, and therefore is more likely to intervene than less experienced peers when scores are low.
Concerns regarding AI accuracy
Many accountants surveyed said they were concerned about the use of AI software, including 62% who were concerned about the errors and accuracy of AI-generated reports. Accountants were also concerned about data security issues and work movements. One area of concern for researchers: “When AI proposes branching categories of uncertain transactions, accountants tend to rely on AI proposals,” he introduces the possibility of errors caused by AI.
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What does this mean for an accounting firm?
For managers: When integrating AI-assisted accounting systems, be aware that technology works best when strengthening existing professionals. Accounting doesn't just follow a set of rules, Choi said. As powerful as AI, it is not always possible to consider all the contexts of information. For example, if your AI has a low confidence score, you need to make decisions from an experienced accountant.
For accountants: Consider using AI to automate many of your grinds and increase job satisfaction. A more experienced accountant may earn even greater benefits.
“There's a really famous meme. “What I want to make AI is to do laundry so I can do laundry. Instead of writing poems, I can do laundry.” “In accounting, there's laundry, there's poems,” she said, for example, laundry and input data, making it more efficient and freeing up time and space in poetry. This means that client interactions, financial forecasts, and high-level thinking will take longer.
“As humans, essentially, we want to work on creative judgment,” Xie said.
For the profession: AI literacy training is required to work together well with accountants, and clear monitoring standards are required to increase AI's net profits. The Xie and Choi study examines AI in the accounting currently employed. It raises doubts about future work. How should organizations prepare for a generation of accountants who have never done accounting work without AI? What tasks and roles do they exist? And how should managers think about the organizational structure of accounting functions?
Read the research
The complete research paper, “Humans and AI in Accounting: Early Evidence from the Field,” describes AI adoption patterns, task reallocation, and how experienced accountants use AI trust scores.
This article is based on the work of Chloe Xie, assistant professor of accounting at MIT Sloan. Her research focuses on capital market incompleteness, such as restrictions on arbitration, deviations from von Neumann Morgensen's preferences, and criminal conduct, how these frictions shape the information environment. Her research considers how these frictions affect disclosure decisions, asset pricing, investor decisions, and non-financial market outcomes.
