Where AI Adoption in Accounting Firms Is Really Going

Speaker A: The pace of AI is just at a blistering pace. And I think with Field Guide, we are at the forefront of a lot of those developments. We have a great privilege and responsibility to bring these innovations to the CPA industry.

Speaker B: Where is AI reshaping strategic direction for

Speaker A: accounting firms with the pace of AI? It's an incredibly dynamic market right now. The firms who are investing heavily in AI, these are the firms are no longer talking about difficulties in hiring. Too many firms are still struggling to keep up with the rapid advances in AI as mentioned. So I don't believe blame these CPA firms at all. Again, I see it as our responsibility to help CPA firms. There's a group of people who are believers and optimists of AI. That doesn't mean we don't see the risks or the things that we need to control.

Speaker B: This is AI reality. Inside Firms, a series on accounting voices where a select group of senior firm leaders and tech CEOs answer the same five related AI questions based on what they're seeing, deciding and being held accountable for inside their firms and their clients. Jin Chan is our special guest today from Field Guide. Jin, welcome to the show.

Speaker A: Thanks Rob, for having me on Field

Speaker B: Guide Jin, we'll get a quick intro from you in a moment. But first I want to five technology companies, including yours, supporting us on this series and genuinely shaping how AI has been applied inside accounting firms. So Field Guide, obviously the AI native platform for audit and advisory firms. We'll hear more about that from Jin and the great things that they're doing. Instead of one of our partners, the first AI tax agent for end to end research, planning, filing and Defense Carbon are involved with us. The global leader in AI powered practice Practice management software digits the AI powered financial intelligence platform for accounting firms and finally filed the Intelligent Tax Workspace for prep and review automation. Great companies, great tech, great partners for accounting firms. Jing Chat, you've been on the show before. We love having you on. You're definitely helping firms chart the journey with AI. Tell us a bit about what you do and then we'll hit the five questions.

Speaker A: Absolutely. So Fuel Guide is uh, what Silicon Valley likes to call a vertical AI company. And that's uh, really enterprise AI company that's fully focused on the CPA Vertical. Vertical. And we're going to talk about horizontal versus vertical. There's value to each feel. Guide is a company that's fully dedicated to helping the CPA profession grow through the talent shortage. And we're pleased to be working with 54 of the top 100 CPA firms in the US and we're just now starting to expand globally as well.

Speaker B: And Jim, before we hit question one, what kind of shape do you feel the accounting profession is in right now? Because there's a lot going on, isn't there?

Speaker A: Absolutely. I mean, and I would argue that across every single sector, not just ours, the pace of AI is just at a blistering pace. And I think with Field Guide, because our team is based out of San Francisco Silicon Valley, we are at the forefront of a lot of those developments. And the good news is, uh, we have a great privilege and responsibility to bring these innovations to the CPA industry. And the other good news is many CPA firms that we work with are showing very encouraging signs of progress. I don't think our industry has seen this kind of leapfrog in productivity and quality gains. Uh, with the help of generative and now agentic AI. Yeah, we're just, uh, excited to be working hand in hand with many firms to do that.

Speaker B: Well, there's no doubt the Field Guide are helping firms get there faster because you mentor them, you guide them, you know this stuff inside out. Let's take question 1. Where is AI reshaping strategic direction for accounting firms?

Speaker A: What I'm noticing, and one of the reasons why I enjoy doing this with you, Rob, is because with the pace of AI, it's an incredibly dynamic market right now. And what I'm finding is that the firms who are investing heavily in AI, and of course bringing a healthy dose of professional skepticism along the way. But these are. The firms are no longer talking about difficulties in hiring, sharing. They're shifting the dialogue towards growth strategy. So one obvious reason for that is because AI productivity is becoming a growth lever. It's uh, unlocking more capacity for firms to start to think about how to grow their firms, whether it's growing their existing practices or expanding into new service lines, all while hitting record margins. These are results that we're, we're definitely seeing with the firms that are investing heavily in AI. It's really the firms who view agents as future engagement management team members. They're rethinking the operating model of the future. What's the formula to win the next decade or two? And it's in large part due to this human and AI collaboration, which is frankly the future that Fuel Guide wants to build towards too. Perhaps most importantly, in a talent constrained market like we are operating in, in the CPA industry, we're seeing that the AI powered CPA firms are better at attracting the industry's best talent. Put simply, top talent want to join AI Powered or AI Forward CPA firms. We see this in Silicon Valley too. The best talent, the engineers, marketers, salespeople, they all want to join AI companies right now to kind of rebuild their skillset for the next decade.

Speaker B: You're very vocal on helping firms chart that AI maturity. Uh, firms are at different stages. And the question 2 Jin asks, what are firms getting wrong about AI?

Speaker A: To be honest, while there's so much promise and great data points that we're seeing, too many firms are still struggling to keep up with the rapid advances in AI. As mentioned, even when we're in Silicon Valley, it's hard to keep up, frankly. So I don't blame DCPA firms at all. Again, I see it as our responsibility to help CPA firms firstly meet them where they are and then help guide these firms through the next transformation era. I think there's a lot of confusion in the market also because every vendor is basically saying the same thing now. Surprising to me how all of a sudden every vendor has AI agents, to be honest with you. But I am actually grateful for some of this too, because what the industry is talking about is forward advances, forward transformation. And whether every vendor supports that vision with their actual that's up for debate. But the good news is there's a shared vision for that future. As you kind of hinted. Field Guide did release our AI maturity framework, and we wanted to offer that to the industry as a practical roadmap to AI transformation to the wider industry, not just for using Fuel Guide. And what we're hearing is incredible feedback about that too, because like you hinted, some firms are just starting their AI journeys, some are already several years ahead. And we try to do our best to tailor our offerings, uh, to meet firms where they are.

Speaker B: Jim, you speak to a lot of firm leaders, CEOs, managing partners, which leadership decisions? This is question three. Which leadership decisions on AI are going to matter most over the next few years?

Speaker A: I encourage CPA firm leaders to treat AI as a first class strategic initiative. And at this point, almost every firm is experimenting with AI in some capacity. What I found is the firms who treat it like an experiment versus, for example, a CEO initiative, they're seeing greatly different results. So really, the best firms who are making the fastest progress, the consistent thread I see across all of them, frankly, is their CEOs are stepping up to lead their AI transformation journeys. They're of course empowering their C suite, their practice leadership, to create a safe but also controlled, secure space for AI use And some really exciting examples that I've picked up along the way is a CPA firm CEO who shared with me that she was vibe coding all weekend and she was creating operational efficiencies at her firm. That's so exciting for us, frankly, because it kind of whets a firm's appetite on what the potential of AI is. And Fuel Guide is a very complementary platform to that kind of general purpose, uh, operational efficiency too.

Speaker B: What you're saying is echoing through many of these interviews that I'm doing with senior firm leaders, they're making it strategic, they're having board level decisions about this and not bolt in AI as an add on to what the firm is doing or buying tech indiscriminately because it's got AI integration. So, uh, that speaks very well with growth. As you've mentioned a lot, Jin comes tension. Question four, ask where is AI? Creating the greatest internal tensions within firms? Because you're inside them as well. You know what's going on in there.

Speaker A: Yeah, and there are a lot of learnings that I'm seeing in Silicon Valley too. Not just Fuel Guide, our company, but also my friends who are operating other companies too. And what we're seeing consistent in Silicon Valley and with CPA firms is there's a group of people who are believers and optimists of AI. That doesn't mean we don't see the risks or the things that we need to control, but they see the promise, uh, the good in the, uh, potential there. And there's another group that likes to point out every risk sacrificing progress. And we're seeing that divide between those two groups of people. Frankly, we as humans have seen these kinds of revolutions before. And one truism across every one of those industrial revolutions is the people who figure out the Next Era operating model, the next gen way of doing things. They are the winners of the Next era. The people who are a bit more stubborn in their own older ways and not really trying to imagine what the future looks like with this revolutionary technology. They may not be as visible in the next era. So we're still in that early inning of humans figuring this out. That's somewhat the reason why we're so excited. Because while we're still early in the journey, we're seeing amazing progress. And there's still so much Runway ahead too.

Speaker B: We've got one more question coming up. A big thank you to instead carbon filed digits and our very own field guide. We got Jin Chan here, the CEO, uh, for their partnership in this series Each of these tech companies plays a, uh, very important role in how firms are bridging the gap between AI ambition and operational reality. So Jin, we are really grateful to you all, uh, being part of this important conversation. Question five asks us to look at the future now. In Silicon Valley, you have one foot in the future and one foot in now. By 2027, maybe 2028, what do you feel will separate the leading firms from the rest?

Speaker A: Yeah, so as I kind of hinted, the winning firms of the next decade will be the ones who figure out this next gen operating model. I think the growing best practice that I'm seeing is reimagining the engagement team of the future to amplify, empower their best human experts in collaboration with AI agents. So the leading firms will have fully integrated AI platforms that are end to end, encompassing the entire engagement lifecycle. They won't be treating AI as an experiment or a quick bolt on or just an Excel plugin. They're thinking about, you know, how to reimagine these engagements of the future, rethinking that operating model, that capacity model, and buying and partnering with the right platform AI platform providers. We're going to see those firms pulling ahead. We're already seeing some firms reporting that they're doubling their or near doubling their revenue per headcount, supporting more clients than ever, hiring the best talent, their firm's histories, and we're going to see that gap widen over the next several years.

Speaker B: Wow, crazy times. This is AI, uh, reality inside firms. Five questions. One influential leader. 12 minutes, no spin. You can find the full series on accounting voices across YouTube, LinkedIn. We're syndicated on CPA trend lines and all major podcast platforms. Jen, I've got one more question for you. Which is what excites you most about the future for accounting firms, particularly with Feel Guide in mind?

Speaker A: So when we started this company, Feel Guide started and continues to be a mission focused company. You and many folks know that Feel Guide is all about helping the CPA practitioner. I was an auditor myself. I wasn't a partner. I was a junior senior manager auditor. And we're building a platform. And I think historically our industry as well as many others have seen enterprise software sales being a top down kind of purchasing decision. Everything about Feel Guide is about building for the people. And when I see genuine smiles from uh, our, from our users, nothing makes me happier than that. I'm just excited to be continuing to invest in building for the people and seeing more of these smiles. And we're uh, here to partner closely with the industry.

Speaker B: Well, definitely the future is a little less foggy and muddy with you holding our hands, leading us into it. Jin Chang from Feel Guide. You're a remarkable individual. You're really changing the game. Thank you so much for joining us today and sharing your insights.

Speaker A: Thanks for having me, Rob. Um.