019 My Clients Think AI Will Do My Job

Oh, buddy, let me tell you, big old Twitter thread about how, quote, AI will devour 97% of an account's job. So this information, whether it's accurate or not, and I actually agree with a lot of the things in this thread, this stuff is like going to be crammed down the throats of our clients over the next couple of years. Like, that's just the world that we live in today. Whether we like it or not, whether we agree or not, whether we think AI is going to do this stuff for us or not. We, we gotta be able to talk with clients about it and it can be super triggering. But this is the world that we're living in these days. And I think a conversation we need to have more is what does it look like to speak confidently about this with our clients so that they're not taking down the old, the old river of misinformation. Right? How do we get them drinking from your Kool Aid? Not by poo pooing on the whole AI thing and saying, ah, it'll never be helpful, because that's not probably true. But how do you make them feel like you're gonna make the most of what's out there for their benefit while dealing with just all the, like, it's like TikTok tax advice. Like, it's just, it's going into our clients heads and it can be really frustrating. So let's talk about it. Okay, I'm gonna read, I'm gonna read the thread here. There's some aspects of it that are annoying, but actually largely agree with it by the end. So Greg Eisenberg, guy on Twitter, he's got 330,000 followers, puts out this Twitter thread, 2 million views on it, 2,800 bookmarks. He says, so tax season's upon us and it's my nightmare. But ChatGPT has been my BFF throughout. Throughout. Now I'm convinced that AI will devour 97% of an accountant's job. And I for one, can't wait to shell out just one tenth of the cost. That's the cost of his accountant. He says, let me give you an example. I've been receiving emails from my accountant that feel like German to me. I don't speak German. So I input them into ChatGPT and ask it to explain everything to me. Like, I'm 16. Guess what, it's working. Old workflow, email back and forth with my accountants, get charged thousands of dollars. New workflow, get information from my accountants. And then prompt, pretend you're accountant GPT you're a senior analyst at a tax firm. Here's an email from my accountant. Explain like I'm 16. Sidebar I love this. I love using ChatGPT to explain things to me like I'm 5 because I'm usually too embarrassed to ask. I think what he's getting at here is rather than having to do a bunch of back and forth with the accountant for the accountant to explain it to him, he's using using ChatGPT. Upsides and downsides to that, since tax information in particular can be highly contextual. But if it's actually being prompted based on what the accountant's telling him, this might be helpful. But I think the cost savings he's talking about is rather than the accountant having to explain everything to me, I've got this other service I can use where ChatGPT can kind of fill in the blanks and. And maybe 100% of that doesn't need to be explained to me by the accountant anymore. Back to the thread. Now imagine you're an accountant. You've been crunching numbers for years, and you're pretty good at it. People are even willing to pay you top dollar for your Expertise. We're talking 500 to $1,000 an hour. And then out of nowhere, this AI, ChatGPT, swoops in and starts doing your job. By doing your job, I think he means explaining tax stuff. And man, it's doing it fast. It's like people watching their favorite movies in their homes instead of theaters. No competition, way cheaper, way more convenient. And you can pause and hit the bathroom. This AI is crunching numbers at lightning speed, leaving you feeling like you just got hit by a truck. And the kicker? Clients are stoked to pay just one tenth of the cost for the same service. Okay, probably even cheaper. GPT4 right now is $20 a month. Ouch. But hey, let's look on the bright side. At least you won't have to worry about deadlines or pulling all nighters or working weekends during tax season anymore, right? That's just fundamentally wrong. Because we're gonna. We're gonna find a way to do that no matter what, he continues. But it's not just about saving money. This AI is creating a ripple effect in the accounting world as it takes on more and more of the mundane tasks. Accountants are starting to realize that they need to level up their game. Just like movie theaters started adding more comfy seats when DVDs and in home theaters were coming out. Accountants will adapt. No more number crunching. It's Time for accountants to focus on strategic planning, financial advice, and all that good stuff the clients really value. Automate everything else, pass the savings to people like me. In the end, it's not about being replaced. It's about working with the AI to provide an even better service at a fraction of the cost and give less heart attacks to people like me. Getting scary tax emails that feel like a mystery. What do you think? Do you largely agree with that? There's a whole bunch of stuff baked into that, so let's kind of tease some things out of there. There is the notion that there's an AI interface that the client can interact with. And I see two flavors of this. I see consumer chat experiences. That is, for example, when QuickBooks had their, whatever they call it, QuickBooks Assistant back in like 16 or 17, it was like a chatbot or voice bot where you could talk with it about your QuickBooks file. And it was very rudimentary. The technology's come a long way since then, but that was fundamentally a system where a business owner could just turn up and have these conversations with the bot about anything. So you have these like consumer type conversations with no guidance. But then the alternative to me that I think is interesting is more of an advisor in the loop sort of chat experience. So that you're enabling something like ChatGPT, but with more context. Because I don't think any advisors necessarily going to lean into the notion that a client can, instead of using them to explain a complex topic, Instead go to ChatGPT or, or someplace where they don't have control over the context it's pulling from. They don't know that this specific situation applies to the client. I don't think any advisor's gonna get excited about just cutting them loose without oversight. But I think there's a version of that experience where the advisor's in the loop, where the advisor can say, hey, AI, if your confidence level on the answer that you're giving is, you know, over 80% sure, that's fine. If it's anything under that, then I need to help answer the question. And if this can serve as a gatekeeper for any of these questions, that becomes super valuable for the advisor. I mean, think about the questions that you get about a company's from a client about their QuickBooks or financial statements. Imagine if there was an app that could cut out 50% of those questions because they're very simple things like show me what was in office expense last month. That would be really valuable for an advisor. But there's some degree of control that you need there as the advisor. Because AI hallucinating through the lens of an advisor is liability. If the AI gives the client a bad answer and then it takes action based on that answer, I don't want to be liable for what that AI told it to do. But when you have a system where the advisor is kind of built into that process and maybe some of those answers that it's confident on, it can give to the client automatically, the ones that it's not, I can step in and answer. But here's the kicker. AI can present to me what it thinks the answer is, or maybe all of the contextual information that will help me answer that question. So that fundamentally that's a better experience answering that question for the client than it would have been otherwise. Best case, the client gets the answer automatically. Worst case, I get like an assistant that presents me with what it thinks the answer is, some helpful context. Like here's what I think the office expense, general ledger detail is. So worst case, it just made it easier for me to answer the question. So that's one part of this discussion that I think is interesting, is like, what does a contextual chat experience look like for a client? And probably the software companies in our space that are best suited to lean into this sort of thing will be those that currently are involved in the client facing experience. So that's probably your practice management system that could be a request system, anything with a portal that clients are interacting with. Those companies have an opportunity to build a client specific interface that can see their context. They can see all of the things specific to them. Maybe that, maybe that program is connected to their QuickBooks file. Maybe it can see the document management system and past tax return files, filings. We're closing in on an age where you can chat with anything. Like you can chat with documents, you can chat with IRS publications. That's kind of becoming trivial already. That's not a hard thing to build. So then ultimately, what is the long term version of that that's valuable? It's chat with specific context. And right now, you as the advisor, you're kind of the hub of all of that context of past tax filings and work papers and source documents and all the nitty gritty that went into completing the accounting? You have all of that context, nobody else has that context. So is there a client chat experience that could be enriched by all of that context that you have where the advisor can still be in the loop to answer questions when maybe the AI can't quite handle it on its own. Now, another interesting thing he comes back to a lot here is saving money. And I can understand what he's saying. If he's not asking the questions of his accountant anymore and he's instead using ChatGPT to, like, fill in some of those blanks, then it's like reducing the number of hours the accountant's spending working on his engagement. Maybe that reduces some cost with his accountant. But I'm also seeing more people, more actual accountants, saying that they see themselves having to reduce accounting fees in the near future, which is interesting because the opposite has been true. Like the last five years, fees have been absolutely going through the roof. So I have a hard time getting my head around fees now dropping because of AI. I think Greg's kind of hitting at the fact that he thinks we'll all be able to help more people for less money. Don't know if that'll be the case or not. Probably too early to call. If, like, if it actually makes our jobs way easier, maybe prices will be forced down because the productized versions of what we do get better. If those handle more and more, then maybe it does bring our prices down a bit because we're able to do so much more work. Way too early to call on that, though. And the other side of this discussion is just how we manage the ex. The mainstream expectations of AI versus what AI will do for us today. And, like, the biggest example of that is when OpenAI and their GPT4 announcement stream quote unquote, prepares a tax return when what they did was using, like, 2018 numbers or something like that. They calculated a tax liability off of a very basic scenario. But the headlines in the news the next day are like, GPT4 can prepare your tax return. And, like, if you look beyond the surface, it should be painfully obvious that that's not really the case. But what we're going to be facing with AI is, is like an extension of what we've been combating with tax misinformation on TikTok for the past couple of years. Is this wave that's bigger than any of us, that is putting oftentimes misinformation in front of our clients, that is setting the expectation of the client to say, hey, is my bill actually gonna go down this year, or is this stuff really gonna be automated in the next few years? The people who are turning up to threads like this and like, reading what Greg is saying, that's exciting. I would love for that to be the case. It's a little too early, honestly, to, like, know for sure, if it's going to help us in the short term in meaningful enough ways to like, bring this stuff to life. But that's not gonna change your client's perception. So how do we manage that disconnect between public perception of what it will do and what it will actually do for us? My answer to that question, which, like, has been the answer for so many things like this for accountants in the past. We're gonna become AI experts. Like, look at cloud adoption. How many small businesses were led through that process by their accountants? Because their accountants were, were the much more tech and process savvy advisor of all of the advisors that they had. So many accountants turned small businesses onto the cloud. And so I think this is like a really exciting opportunity to develop this new domain expertise that not only will support our firms, but can also support the small businesses. Because many of the small businesses are up against the same narrative that we are, that what they do is going to be displaced by AI, when in reality it's probably just going to enhance and enrich what they do and it will maybe eliminate some of the more menial aspects of what they do. But there's also an opportunity there for them to become the advisor that helps them realize those opportunities. So is there a way for us to flip this narrative on its head to say, I know you're excited about AI being able to automate the work that I do and this be more streamlined and maybe even lower cost to, to be able to say, here's some, some practical applications of how we're using AI today. But also, have you looked at how to use AI within your business? And is there a way that I can help you with that? If they can reduce their tax fees from $5,000 to $4,000, great. If you can like double the capacity of their employees, oh, they will, they will happily pay you much more than a thousand dollars to be able to help them with that. So is there a way that we can like, reframe this conversation around actual AI thought leadership and you being able to put your finger on like, hey, here's, here's actually some opportunities where in your business you could potentially leverage this? It's stuff that we've been trying within our firm that might be valuable to you. And so maybe this, like, kind of gets me back to what I think are ultimately the main protectors of what we do from being displaced by AI. Like, I've got, I've, I've got all of these sayings the people repeat back to me that they love That I don't even necessarily believe. Like, you know, accountants leveraging AI. No, I won't replace accountants. Accountants using AI will replace accountants not using AI, Stuff like that. That feels really good when you hear it, right? Like, yeah, no, yeah, man, you're right. I don't know if that's going to be the case or not. Maybe AI in the hands of Intuit or something like that will replace a whole bunch of what we do. Reality is, nobody knows. So, like, all you can do is think through what is the right thing for me to do today, like, what do I need to do tomorrow. And so I always come back to this framework of always looking for greater specificity in what you do. First, stuff to go away will always be the general stuff, right? In the same way that ChatGPT is like a better version of Google Search now, it's starting there. It doesn't have the super mega specific domain expertise. So keep finding greater specificity in what you do, in your value chain of the things that you deliver. Ensure that what's delivering value are those human touch points. If the value that you deliver is all categorizing bank transactions or something like that, then yeah, you're probably in a bad spot. So if you look at the value chain of what your business does and like, what are the things that you deliver to clients. Greg made this point in the thread. In fact, I'll pull that up. It's time for accounts to focus on strategic planning, financial advice, and all that good stuff the clients really value. He's right. If your business is positioned to just do the transactional stuff right now, that's probably not a great place to be. That was the case before AI. So second, ensure that like, that value that you're delivering is not based on transactional work. It's not based on putting numbers on forms. And then third, become an expert. Just educate yourself. Like, find the circles where people are hanging out that are developing this expertise on the fly. And that's. There's a great segue into my shower thought. Caps on. I heard a word the other day. It's called senious S C E N I U S. It's pretty cringey. I've seen it credited to a few different places. But it's the idea that in the Internet age, cool ideas and cool movements come from a scene, not from a person's brain, but from a scene. Kind of a collection of people that rally around a common idea and the fact that they're working on that stuff together improves everybody. Gets you all to a better place. And we're absolutely building that right now. Like, the people that are turning up to this show every day that are interested in learning where we're doing a lot of talking about AI and exploring how we can lean into that stuff day over day. It's not me figuring it all out. It's me figuring some stuff out. It's me learning from a bunch of other people and then me serving as kind of like the lighthouse to get those people together so that we can share what we're building. And so if the ultimate source of protection from being displaced by AI is education, is just understanding what's happening so that you're not surprised by change doesn't mean you won't have to change. It just means you won't be displaced by change overnight. Like, it won't take you by surprise. Then how do you go out and find the scene where people are figuring this stuff out day over day? I think that's ultimately what protects you against AI and any of this stuff taking you by surprise. And so it's like, it's kind of funny. This Daily show came at a time where there's a lot changing. There's a lot of unknowns, a lot of spooky stuff, a lot of stuff that's probably blown out of proportion, but I don't want to be surprised by it. So, like, is there a version of this where we can collectively help each other out just to keep plugged into what's happening and to come out of all of this, like, being able to have an informed discussion about AI and how it applies specifically to what you do for your clients. Because if you dazzle them with, hey, do you know you can actually do this in your business with AI? Like, poof, there goes any concerns they may have about, should I really be paying all this for this stuff that I can seemingly do? You throw out the window, like, all of those concerns about them having an old timey accountant that doesn't understand this stuff, that isn't leaning into this cool thing I just saw in a news article or a Twitter thread that should really replace tax preparation and all that stuff. If you can come at it from the standpoint of thought leadership and the opportunity of AI and help clients understand what that opportunity is, I think you totally cut through the client taking control of the narrative and saying, shouldn't all this stuff just be easier and cheaper and all that. That's what I think the move is. Doesn't make it any less frustrating when clients get that misinformation and they're like, hey, I hear AI can do tax returns now. And you're like, nope, nope. But here's what it can do. I would love it if it could do tax returns. I would use it overnight. I think this is like a fun time for tech savvy people to build that expertise and wow their clients. And it's not a high bar. Like, as we saw with cloud adoption and how cloud adoption is still lagging so far behind, it is not going to take a mountain of AI expertise for you to be well ahead of the curve when it comes to advising small business clients. So let's build that new muscle together. Let's flex that. I think as long as we're staying plugged into it like, we're absolutely not at risk. That's all I got for today. Thanks for coming and hanging and I'll see you tomorrow.