The pace of change in finance has accelerated dramatically. What used to take days—closing the books, building forecasts, analyzing variances—can now be compressed into hours or even minutes with the right AI-augmented workflows. The professionals who learn to harness these tools aren’t just more productive; they become strategic partners who can focus on judgment, storytelling, and decision support instead of manual data wrangling.
The Opportunity Is Here
AI is no longer a distant “someday” for finance. Large language models can summarize lengthy documents, generate first drafts of commentary, and answer ad-hoc questions about your data. Specialized tools can automate reconciliations, flag anomalies, and surface insights from unstructured data. The ROI for teams that adopt these capabilities early is real: less time on repetitive work, fewer errors, and more capacity for analysis and advisory.
Why Now?
Waiting has a cost. As more organizations pilot and scale AI in finance, the gap between early adopters and the rest will widen. Hiring and retention will increasingly favor people who are comfortable with AI-augmented workflows. Clients and stakeholders will expect faster, clearer, and more data-driven answers. Learning AI now isn’t about replacing your expertise—it’s about amplifying it so you can lead the next chapter of your function.
What You Can Do Today
Start small: use AI to draft emails, summarize meeting notes, or explore a new dataset with natural language. Invest in one or two tools that fit your stack (spreadsheet add-ins, BI integrations, or custom scripts). Most importantly, adopt a mindset of experimentation. The finance professionals who thrive in the next decade will be those who treat AI as a core part of their toolkit, not a threat or a buzzword.
The future of finance is human + AI. The best time to start was yesterday; the second best is now.