Stampli Identifies the Barriers Holding Back Adoption of AI in Finance Teams

Stampli, the AI-powered Accounts Payable automation solution, released new research shedding light on the state of AI adoption among finance professionals. Stampli partnered with Probolsky Research, a leading market and opinion research firm, to survey attitudes around AI among different job titles within finance. The survey results indicate that while AI holds significant promise for improving Accounts Payable (AP) processes, effectively scaling the use of AI requires solving barriers at points across financial organizations.

The Stampli Accounts Payable Survey finds that widespread interest in AI integration is tempered by notable differences in enthusiasm for the technology as well as the perceived risks and benefits. Senior decision-makers are the most interested in AI, while human oversight and data security issues stand out as the principal roadblocks to adoption. The respondents represent AP stakeholders in financial services as well as industries like professional services and manufacturing, with job titles ranging from AP team members to senior finance managers and Chief Financial Officer-level positions.

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“AP processes are among the most manual in business. They can drag efficiency and increase the likelihood of incorrect or late payments, reducing cash flow visibility. This, in turn, creates a risk to vendor relationships and hinders strategic cash flow management,” said Eyal Feldman, CEO and Co-Founder of Stampli. “AI is much better suited to this work, with substantial efficiency and cost benefits to an organization. CFOs who see the value should understand why people in the organization are hesitant and address those concerns head on.”

• The C-suite embraces AI: Respondents in company leadership are the most interested in adopting AI for AP processes, like document capture, coding, and fraud detection, with C-suite (92%) and senior-level management (85%) saying they are interested. Although they largely embrace the potential of AI across the board, management-level respondents still named concerns around privacy and data security (44%) and technical learning curves (32%) as adoption barriers.
• Less buy-in across the organization: The survey found an enthusiasm gap between senior management and accounts payable team members. Overall, 68% of AP team members surveyed were very or somewhat interested in the potential of AI for their function, with only 18% of respondents choosing the most positive response. This could be attributed to their uncertainties related to the benefits and job impacts, indicating a need for more proactive education and outreach on AI from company leadership.
• Leaders are eager for efficiency gains: Perceptions of the benefits of AI in AP also varied according to job title. Approximately 55% of both C-Suite and senior management cited improving accuracy as the top benefit, followed by improved processing speeds and fraud detection. AP team members, however, viewed improving processing speeds as the key benefit (48%), followed by improving financial system efficiency and refocusing humans on more valuable tasks. This reflects the day-to-day operations and efficiency priorities among AP team members, while managers tend to see more holistic benefits with AI.
• The need for a human in the loop: AP team members were much more likely to express a hesitancy towards full automation than C-suite and senior-level managers (64% vs. 32% and 41%, respectively). However, 63% of AP team members surveyed were more inclined to embrace AI if decisions were subject to human approval. Integrating human decision-making into AI systems could solve adoption barriers among AP teams, but this will likely require additional education for financial leadership on how AI systems and human oversight can work together.

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The research results parallel the broader conversation on enterprise AI integration while providing in-depth insights into the evolving role of AI in finance functions. The findings also demonstrate a growing demand for innovative Accounts Payable solutions, like Stampli, that can help integrate AI capabilities while also mitigating employee concerns, knowledge gaps, and adoption pain points.

One example of AI that has been successfully embraced by AP organizations is Stampli’s Billy the Bot™, which performs otherwise manual tasks such as capturing information on invoices, allocating costs to the correct cost centers, identifying approval workflows, detecting fraud, and more. Two key elements of Billy’s design have proven crucial in customer acceptance: humanizing and personifying the technology, and ensuring that humans retain full control over validating the AI’s decisions. Stampli customers often described Billy as a member of the team.

“CFOs can rest assured that AI is not a replacement for human oversight; it’s an amplifier,” stated Anthony Fernandes, Financial Controller at Alden Group Renewable Energy. “Without AI, I would require five full-time Accounts Payable specialists. Instead, a single person handles this workload, dedicating just 20% of their time. That’s a 25-fold efficiency boost, directly impacting company profitability. By automating routine tasks, AI frees up my team’s valuable time to focus on edge cases, where their expertise is truly needed.”

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In Q1 2024, Bloomberg Beta and Stampli are hosting a series of invite-only think tank sessions to help CFOs balance the incredible pace of AI innovation against the more deliberate speed of Finance. Attendance is strictly limited to a small number of forward-thinking finance leaders who want to accelerate their AI strategies years ahead of their competition.

[To share your insights with us, please write to sghosh@martechseries.com]