If there was ever a time to start taking AI seriously, it’s now. Generative AI is predicted to be big business and will likely have a significant impact on the finance function in the coming years.
That means CFOs need to get on board—yesterday. But where to begin? For executives trying to figure out the first step into AI, here’s what some CFOs are saying about their current AI investment plans.
On the look out. HP Inc. CFO Marie Myers told the Wall Street Journal she’s “aggressively looking” for ways to incorporate generative AI into the company’s workflow. On the finance side, she’s specifically eyeing ways to use AI during earnings preparation, which impacts investor relations.
AI could aid that “heavy process” by using it “to prepare the appropriate documents” and evaluate “what language works and doesn’t work,” she explained. “We see this as an opportunity to take a lot of work out of that process and potentially actually drive a much more effective outcome.”
According to Myers, other CFOs will have to become similarly nimble, simply due to how quickly generative AI will upend business as usual. “This is a really significant management of change,” she said. “Finance professionals like rigidity and they like structure. This disrupts everything.”
Still, given a patchy regulatory framework, she’s exercising caution. “I don’t think the governance road map is written yet,” Myers said. “As CFOs, we’re pretty prudent so you’re not going to put yourself in a situation where you take undue risk.”
Streamlining. Ravi Inukonda, CFO of DoorDash, told CFO Brew he expects generative AI to eventually become “part of our daily workflow” across industries.
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That’s a good thing, in his mind: As businesses get more complicated, CFOs will also have more data available, thanks to AI, that can be used to make the kinds of decisions that would typically require substantial time and effort.
Inukonda is particularly excited about generative AI’s potential to refine his company’s accounting workflow. Thousands of vendors send invoices to DoorDash, he explained. “I imagine a future when the end-to-end process from an invoice processing perspective can be handled by generative AI,” he said.
In all, he wants other CFOs to think of AI as “another toolkit in your arsenal” rather than a professionally threatening technology.
Future focused. Alice Globus, finance chief at Nanotronics, a science technology company, has the kind of background that makes her ready to adopt new technology: She initially trained to be an astrophysicist.
In fact, that’s what spurred her switch to finance: Globus says she “wanted to invest in the future technology of tomorrow,” per an interview with Fortune. She says her company, Nanotronics, is "the first to apply artificial intelligence to inspection within manufacturing," meaning it ingests data from factories and uses AI to identify ways to reduce waste and costs while maximizing efficiency.
Globus wants other CFOs to look for similar AI use cases, explaining that “the power of analytics and observation is just not obtainable through humans.”
“The amount of stuff that can be measured and quantified is immense. This is where the role of becoming a strategic CFO really matters,” she added. “With that data, you can make really educated decisions on where you could allocate your resources.