Happy Monday!
I’m currently in Mountain View for my last session on Intuit’s Partner Council.
Here’s a shorter one on something I think about every single day.
Table of Contents
Is more complexity really safer?
Last week I was at an accounting event and a topic kept popping up in conversation.
It was about firms feeling like they need to move towards complexity and towards larger clients because of how AI is starting to look.
At Celerity, we work with clients that take us an hour for month-end and clients that take us an entire week. I can’t help but agree with the sentiment that the “1-hour” Quickbooks client is likely to be more automated by incoming AI, than the larger, more complex client on Netsuite.
But, does larger really mean it’s safer? I’m not so sure that’s the best way to think about it.
The complexity play
The bet most firms seem to be making is that complexity is the hedge. Move up-market. Take on bigger clients. Do the work AI can't do yet.
I get it. We do plenty of that work. Multi-entity consolidations, NetSuite implementations, the kind of judgment calls that don't have an easy answer. That work is safer today. I just don’t think it’s the whole answer long term.
I think the people betting purely on complexity and expertise are missing something.
Where I am focusing
There are a few different way’s I’m thinking about the future alongside increased technology from AI.
AI feels empty compared to human touch. It’s like the fast food drive through where you only talk to the robot. Talking to AI feels lonely. Human connection feels great. That won’t change.
We can use this to provide way more value for our clients. Without the same level of work and cost. We can create dashboards, automate flows of data, and do so much more for our clients with increased technology.
AI can’t “partner” with clients like we can. It’s a tool. We have their back, we’re there to work together using the data, and we’re using the AI to continuously improve the business.
Experienced expertise - AI can read the tax code, but it’s hard to give context on experience. “Yes, that’s what the documentation says… but in real life, here’s what auditors actually care about.”
The feeling
The firms that thrive in the future aren't vendors to their clients, they're partners to them.
That's not a strategy I came up with because of AI. It's how I've always wanted Celerity to feel. AI just makes the difference between the two more obvious.
A vendor delivers a deliverable. A partner picks up the phone. A vendor sends the report. A partner notices the thing in the report nobody asked them to look at. A vendor competes on price, speed, and turnaround. A partner is the person you call before you make a decision or to chat about the future.
AI is going to be the best vendor anyone's ever seen. Cheap, fast, never tired, never wrong on the easy stuff. If that's what your firm is, that's a hard thing to compete with.
But if your clients see you as a partner, someone who's in it with them, who knows their business, who they actually want in the room - you're not really competing with AI at all.
You’re playing a completely different game.
That's the bet I’m making.
Question for you
How do you think AI is going to change your firm in the next 3-5 years?
Have a great week!
Tailor