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Agentic Edge
Transitioning finance to continuous insight
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Most modern businesses operate continuously, yet finance functions remain bound to calendar cycles designed for paper ledgers.
In this episode of Agentic Edge, host Micah Smith speaks with Ken Mertzel (Global Finance Leader at Automation Anywhere) and Craig Richey (Senior Managing Director at Accenture) about transitioning finance from periodic reporting to continuous decision support.
They discuss how agentic process automation resolves complex accounting standards, how to reverse the traditional 90/10 data trap, and why unifying automation and AI governance under one center of excellence is key to scaling continuous finance operations.
Welcome to Agentic Edge, where we explore the frontier of AI agents, enterprise orchestration, and the architectures that are shaping tomorrow's intelligent enterprises. In this episode, we are going to be looking at something that has been sitting in plain sight for decades. Most businesses run continuously. Customers transact, markets move, decisions happen in real time. But when you walk into a finance function, you're still kind of operating on a calendar that feels like it was built for a different era. We've got things like monthly close, quarterly forecasts, annual planning cycles. The business moves at the speed of decision and now, and finance reports on what happened six weeks ago or a quarter ago. That gap used to just be an inconvenience, but now with AI and automation maturing so quickly, it's becoming a genuine competitive liability. The organizations that close it first are going to really outdecide and outperform everyone else. Today we're breaking down what it actually takes to move finance from periodic reporting to continuous insight, where mistakes are happening, and what's separating the leaders from the teams that are stuck running endless proof of concepts. So joining me in our conversation this week is Ken Merzel. Ken is a global finance leader at Automation Anywhere who advises some of our top customers on high value opportunities that enable them to transform finance using agentec process automation based on his 20 years industry experience as a senior finance executive. Also joining me is Craig Ritchie, who is a senior managing director at Accenture, where he is the finance reinvention partner lead for Canada, US, and Latin America. And Craig helps Accenture clients across every industry rethink their finance operating models with an agentic mindset enabled by cutting edge technology. So I want to jump right into this. And Ken, I want to start with you. Where are organizations feeling the pressure that certain functions maybe aren't moving fast enough?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think he really touched on two of them. I mean, absolutely first and foremost, the financial reporting and financial close process. Again, it tends to be uh very focused around peak crunch times at month end or quarter end, um, creating a lot of pressure in their organization. Uh, secondly, clearly in the whole budgeting and forecasting, financial planning analysis area, which you know, most organizations start with their annual plan, get through that, then they start immediately going into probably three times a year re-forecasting. And as soon as they finish one, they go to the next, um, with no real time in either the financial reporting or the forecasting area to really be able to sit back, analyze the results because they're so focused on the transaction and think about what are the implications? Uh, how should I uh think about you know improving performance going forward?
SPEAKER_00Craig, in large organizations, what does this look like operationally? Do you have some examples of where your customers or partners that you're working with are facing this kind of challenge?
SPEAKER_02I just want to double down a little bit on, you know, Ken definitely identified some of the key areas that all our clients are going through. I think it's it's really interesting in this world of today because all finance organizations are being asked to higher quality of information, more speedy decision making, and really being asked to go above and beyond. And I think the the other thing that's super critical too is that what that means for a finance organization is that when they have these lengthy cycles, the lengthy cycle of the past is not what you can do in the future because they just have to make better decisions more quickly. I think the second thing is I remember, you know, the days when I was a budget analyst, financial analyst, and you know, my boss would come into the room and it's like, hey, I need these decisions by tomorrow. And I, you know, I had more hair back then, but I'd scratch my head and say, there's no way that I'm gonna be able to make those decisions. It would have been late nights, long hours. And honestly, a lot of the practitioners were really would burn out during either month in close or financial planning cycle. And as we look at the future, that is uh something that is becoming less acceptable for our clients. They have to close much more quickly with purpose. They have to understand that when you're closing the books monthly, that you're not waiting, you know, I'll call the weeks to get into better decision making. So those are the things that when I think about it, our clients, regardless of industry, the past of lengthy cycles, longer decision-making time, and not having right information will be the past. It's really how do you get to more efficient, more accurate, and really timely decision to really decide the direction they go in the future?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and in fact, in that example you gave, I think the typical experience is right, you'd spend 90% of your time collecting all the data, putting it in a report, and maybe that last 10% actually analyzing and and identifying opportunities. And obviously with automation, it reverses that.
SPEAKER_00Craig, what has changed operationally over the past few years? Obviously, technology landscape has changed quite a bit, but what's changed operationally and how are customers that you're working with dealing with that?
SPEAKER_02I think one of the things when we think about just finance as a function, I think one thing we have to remember is that while finance is a function, it's really one of the I'll call it capabilities that is enterprise-wide across the organization. So when you think about transformation, you just can't think of it from a functional standpoint. You really have to look at end-to-end processes that go out to the business if you're really going to get to leading processes. Having that thinking, there's a couple of things that become really uh clear in the future. One, that's the opportunity for process centralization, standardization, and ultimately transformation. And when we define transformation, it's more of like looking at capabilities and more value-added processes, right? So adding value to the business is something that when we, you know, drive our programs. The other thing too is um you can't do this without some sort of technology enablement, right? Because that technology is going to enable better processes, which then will allow better information, better data, which gets it at insights. And ultimately, you have the ability to automate those routine trap tasks and really get to the, I'll call it the enabling insights. So to me, the one thing that's truly different, I'll say over the last, you know, 24 months, and it's even uh scaling much more quickly, is that you have to transform to get to better insights.
SPEAKER_00Craig, how do you think about this? Is it faster insights? Is it better insights, or is it both? And what are the most important values that you're looking for?
SPEAKER_02Well, ultimately I definitely want it to be faster, but in reality, I want it to be quality, right? Just because you go faster doesn't mean it's better. But the reality is how are you making sure that you get information that is more first-time quality that I can make strategic decisions for the business? And that's something that is super critical because when you're looking at, you know, the decisions that are, I'll call it backward-based, you can't do anything with that. You have to look more forward business, forward-based, because that's the really the only ability to change the direction of the business.
SPEAKER_00Ken, where are you seeing organizations starting to see real operational improvements in some of these areas?
SPEAKER_01I think if you take a look at the two areas we talked about, you know, first of all, the financial close process. I mean, of course, as you'd expect, there's been improvements in terms of automation, automating the basic transactional tasks. But what really gets me excited and what's really transformed your organizations, to Craig's point, is actually taking things that traditionally said, oh, that I have to rely on that person that has 20 years of technical accounting experience and infusing that into the process. So someone who's relatively new in the organization has all the benefit of that knowledge. And so I'm seeing real enhancements in, for example, like technical accounting, where you might have a very complex journal entry and the technology leveraging, you know, a combination of technologies, but particularly led by AI agents, is able to take a look at that transaction, go out to the accounting standards uh in whatever regions relevant, GAP, AFI, FRS, et cetera, and be able to actually provide a recommendation saying, hey, here's what I think are the key uh relevant accounting standards. This is how I suggest booking the entry, but then having Hume in the loop rather than just automating that that entry. So that's a complete revolution in terms of, you know, in the accounting side. And similar to what I'm seeing in financial planning analysis, where again, obviously you can have technology uh source the data, right? And then put that into a forecast. But the really interesting and exciting stuff is where you're having AI-enabled performance analysis, right? So certainly, A, it can tell you not only what the variance is versus versus plan, but what were the underlying drivers of that. And then most importantly, hey, what could I do to improve performance uh if I tweak certain drivers? What are the things that are really going to drive change? That's the stuff that's really, you know, transformative, I think.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I chuckle a little bit, uh, you know, Ken around that, because what you're really talking about is all these, I call these great humans today that are reconciling, trying to figure out all this data, really getting them in the world, they can actually do the thinking, right? And and I think so many of our clients are challenged today is because by the time that you get to the end of the month, or if you're looking at a forecast, you're just doing too much of what does this spreadsheet say, or reconciling the data between you know different sources. Now we're getting to the purpose of actually using people to actually do what they're supposed to do, you know, that thinking and get to the right results as well. So that to for me as a person that, you know, a long time ago when I said I had hair, like I would kind of go to this stuff now, that's what I wanted to do. You know, I think we're getting more closer to making those right decisions and not doing all that reconciliation, all that work going forward.
SPEAKER_00A critic will say, We've had automation for 20 years. Why is it taking this long for us to make meaningful improvements like this in finance? How do you answer that?
SPEAKER_02I think one, when we think about process transformation, it's really uh in-to-end transformation. So end-to-end processes. In end-to-end processes, you can't just look at just the the process, you got to look at the operating model, right? Because the accountability matrix, you got to look at the data, all those sort of things. Because I think there was a piece before where we would try to automate simple tasks, but think about that you automatic the task and then some other thing pops up, right? So really having that end-to-end sort of perspective and focusing on building value-led processes with true outcomes is something that we're seeing much more and more. And the clients that take that end-to-end approach, that capability approach, that value approach are really getting to true transformative, I'll call it outcomes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I agree. And I think, you know, technology is really the enabler because things like I described in terms of infusing that technical accounting knowledge or that knowledge of being able to analyze results. Um, I mean, really, you couldn't do it with some of the traditional automation before. So everything's not about AI, right? You don't need AI for everything, but to do some of those transformative things, that's really enabled things that, you know, five, 10 years ago you just couldn't do.
SPEAKER_02I think the other thing we're seeing much more at our clients is that in the past it would be a technology led, right? I think about one of the workshops that I was in last week, and I was super excited because we had the right parties in the room to get the outcome. So you had the CIO with the CFO, right? And then I'll call it the wheel of people around that really coming together to get to the best outcome. And I think that's something that is super important because it's just not one single pillar that's going to get to the best outcome for our client. As we look at transformation, it's a it's a success item that you have to do. If you don't, it becomes much more challenging.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I like that. It can't be just top down, but it also can't just be bottom up, right? You're not going to be able to lead technology transformation just with technology itself. The other thing I'll mention that you guys just mentioned a second ago is that I think it's yes and, right? Automation still serves the purpose for a lot of these solutions and it all ultimately becomes a tool that these agents are able to use. And so you're embedding that existing benefit of being able to use automations, interfacing with APIs, all of those things, and giving that to an agent who can actually make some of those goal-based decisions. Ken, we talked about some of the things of what it looks like when this is done right. Tell me about some of the mistakes that you're seeing organizations make right now.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, what you and Craig just mentioned is the number one mistake I've seen, which is companies saying, oh, like, what do I do with AI? What things should I focus on with AI? And I completely reverse it to Craig's question, which is what are your biggest business challenges? What are your strategic objectives? Then you can decide what are the appropriate tools, which maybe AI may not be. So that's first and foremost, because there's so much hype about AI. Everyone's trying to think, what do I do with AI? And instead, it's to be like, what's my business challenge? And then how I'm going to address it with technology and process change, et cetera. So that's absolutely number one. The second is also what Craig mentioned earlier, which is I think because we had the old mindset of like changing tasks, right? And automating tasks. And I think really need to be focusing on how can I reimagine the process as opposed to how can I automate the way the process works today, right? And then the third, more generally, is just a lot of organizations are just doing tons of POCs. And again, it's important to experiment and learn about AI, what have you, but but you have to do that in an organized and strategic manner. And so I think making sure you're prioritizing and constantly focused on business value as opposed to let me do a whole bunch of POCs, which might be interesting, but ultimately are going to drive significant value, is probably the third challenge I've seen.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I would add to, I mean, Ken is uh as usual spot on in terms of his observations. I I think one of the interesting uh dilemmas that we're in situations we're going through our clients is how much do you understand today to build to the tomorrow, or do you start with tomorrow to build to the future? And it's interesting because when you think about a lot of the, I'll call it looking at the future state processes, you can't really go at it re-engineering the past. That's why we really go through looking at the future in terms of capability-led, outcome-based, and then backing up and building a process model that fits for you. Doesn't mean you don't have to understand what the future state processes were, but really focusing on the critical things and information you need to be actually a much more leading outcome-based process. That's something that's challenging because when you look at most of the folks who are doing great work at our clients and performing the this work in sometimes some very difficult processes because they don't have the tech, or, you know, I'll call it the misalignment across organization. But when you start to think future-based and outcome-based, it really transforms how people work and the value and the output that they get performing their processes in the future and findings.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, the one thing I'll add to that is it does, even though again, it's not all about the technology, a lot of times it does help to show a demo or an example of what technology can do. Because if I ask you to reimagine the process, but you think there's absolutely no way I could possibly do that, you may not even raise the ideas. And the demos are not so much to like highlight the technology, it's more so they think about art of the possible, like, oh, I didn't realize we could even do that. And that opens up even more, you know, reinvention possibly.
SPEAKER_02Excellent point. Excellent point.
SPEAKER_00Craig, as organizations start to adopt more of this technology and start to really transform their processes, governance and ownership is really important. Tell me about what that means for organizations as these initiatives start to scale.
SPEAKER_02A couple things when obviously, you know, finance, you really have to focus on governance, risk, and controls, right? That's something that's super important and is not going away, right? So I think just having that mindset, but thinking about data security, super important, right? There is industry differentiation there, you know, process accuracy, really thinking about processes in terms of what that means for your industry. A consumer goods company is very different than utilities company, which is different than a high-tech company, right? And the information is much structured around that to get to the right outcome. And I think one of the bigger items that's all on everybody's right now is just the TCL, right? The application stack, you know, token support and maintenance, you know, what is that cost, right? And so there's a lot of conversation around tokenomics and what's going through that and what's the cost, right? That's something that, you know, we we definitely have our points of view. It's something that just having clarity because you don't want to buy too much, right? And really getting back to what is right for that business as well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think a couple points on that. So one is it's another reason why I wouldn't only focus on AI. I mean, AI does a lot of interesting stuff, but to your point, right, there are expenses associated with it in terms of tokens. And that's why sometimes a more deterministic approach, you know, RPA, you name it, make makes sense because you get a very clear answer and you don't have some of those associated costs. That's why I always think it's a a combination of technologies. The other um issue I've seen around governance is organizations are, you know, appropriately immediately start setting up governance related to AI. But I think in terms of setting up a center of excellence, I wouldn't set up centers of excellence for different technologies. I think it's more of an automation center because I've seen like RPA COEs and then AI COEs. And I think it's more of an automation center of excellence that makes a lot more sense.
SPEAKER_00Craig, with the finance leaders that you've been working with, what separates those organizations that are making significant progress versus those that you find are struggling?
SPEAKER_02I think there's three kind of uh key items. Number one, it all comes down to leadership, right? So when we look at our programs that are successful from a reinvention standpoint, it always starts with value because value defines the principles, how you go with the program. But it's really the CFO being really involved because these are highly transformative programs. So you really need that leadership from the finance organization, but you also need just as much from I'll call it the business enablement side. So outside of finance. As I said earlier, that when we look at you know a reinvention program and from a finance, it's not finance. You have to take the business and the business segment as a part of the solution. Then the third piece ultimately comes down to governance. One of the things is you establish like the structure around decisions, being really clear around what are the principles, right? What are the you know, OKRs, all the things that are going to drive the program, you need to have that laid out up front and making sure that all partners are very clear, these are critical for the decisions as you go forth, because as you go through these programs, they only get tougher as you go along, right? So just making sure that you have that clarity. When people do that, they go really well. When they don't have that leadership or haven't involved the business or they don't have the governing principles, those are the programs that become more costly, or you don't get the right outcome from a reinvention standpoint.
SPEAKER_00We've seen quite a bit in the news recently about organizations who have basically blown their entire AI budget within the first six months of the year. In your mind, is that a failure of technology being outside of the governance and the controls of the organization? Is it the failure of a finance leader to keep on top of these things? Is it a combination of the two? How would you guide one of those leaders?
SPEAKER_02I think it's when they don't have a clear strategy in place up front, right? It's almost like people going searching for the shiny tool to solve all, right? That's why just having the, you know, in this case, the business with the CFO, having a strategy in place versus going to the shiny toy, because what happens is you'll start to have 15 different conversations with different perspectives, and you start buying things that you may or may not need, which gets those situations. So it's really strategy and leadership in my perspective. I don't know, Ken, your thoughts on that as well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I completely agree. And number one is rub focus, as I talked about earlier, the strategic business objectives, get the business engaged. Um, that usually drives us. So if you start with a value focus up front, instead of let me do a whole bunch of POCs and see if some of them work out, drive value, that tends to drive more focus.
SPEAKER_00So, Ken, Craig talked about the shiny toy, which I think we all can can relate to where we see these new technologies. It's a startup, it's a SaaS company offering us something. Where do you recommend finance leaders focus first?
SPEAKER_01It really comes down to identifying what are your strategic objectives and what particularly what are your KPIs you're trying to address. And then you can figure out which tools make sense. Um, also sort of re-it reiterating some of the points from earlier. Um, really think about like I look at this as a unique opportunity to completely transform your business. Don't think about making incremental change at this point. Um, look at how, you know, what's going to completely reinvent the way you do things. And then the other thing I'd say, especially if you're in the early stages, is just look for some quick wins. I think people look for this massive end-to-end transformation, like day one. And I'd say, especially if you're early on, like look for something that it's gonna generate a quick win, clearly add value, show people the benefit of what you know automation can do. And then once you've done that, yeah, absolutely scale. Don't do 20 more POCs. But looking for those quick wins earlier, I think are really critical, also to get that retrolike investment that you talked about.
SPEAKER_00All right. Last question for both of you. We have a lot of listeners who are obviously interested in what you've been talking about. They want to make some momentum in this area. Give me one key thing that you would guide them to get started with. And Craig, I'm I'll start with you. What's the one key thing for someone who wants to make momentum that you would have them uh get started with? It's always tough with one.
SPEAKER_02So, you know, put me on the spot here first. I think the the one thing I would say is don't be scared of for the future. I look at this as an opportunity within the finance space. We're going through a unique time that finance is at the center, and most of our clients from reinvention. Don't wait for it to happen. Take the opportunity and lead it to happen.
SPEAKER_01All right, Ken, your key takeaway. All right. I got an extra 15 seconds to think about it. I agree, you know, definitely um like get started now. I think a lot of people are saying, I'll wait and see how things shake out. So absolutely start quicker. But what I would say um is actually, you know, again, you could work on any area in finance. I typically see a lot of benefit in starting with some of the more transactional areas like accounts payable or accounts receivable, um, only because you can get some early wins, particularly when organizations are looking to prove out not only obviously controls, but efficiency, and then definitely then diving into other huge areas of opportunity like record to report and FPA.
SPEAKER_00Love that. Ken, Craig, you have made it through my gauntlet of finance questions. Thank you so much for joining me this week on Agentic Edge.