Automation is coming to finance teams—if it hasn’t already arrived. Finance and accounting teams often are forced to work with legacy systems that aren’t integrated with other systems across the company. This makes many of the simple tasks they do far more time-consuming than necessary. As a result, many finance team members still complete calculations as they switch back and forth between technology systems—what the industry calls “swivel chair” work.

With increasing use of new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), finance managers see significant opportunities to improve their capacity and transform their department. ASUG research from 2017 and 2018 explored challenges for finance teams, current automation practices, and methods for handling revenue recognition accounting, or lease accounting. Our white paper suggests two solutions for automating financial processes and explains how process automation can enhance key finance processes.