The Situation

Over the last few years, we’ve entered into an age that feels increasingly like a modern-day industrial revolution. While AI is not new, it is now far more practical, accessible, and is accelerating at rapid growth across every workflow that powers the economy. 

At Cast Finance, we believe this wave of technological change has the potential to elevate human expertise, not replace it. The value won’t be unlocked instantly upon building. It takes adoption. Adoption with training and human judgment to use the new tools to remove friction and to empower people to drive decisions. Technological advancements (specifically AI) have the potential to improve our unique professional contributions, not replace them. We’re seeing countless positive use cases emerge, but the true value will only be unlocked by teams who adopt these tools with intention, clarity, and human judgment.

The Problem

• Many industries that support small and midsize businesses (accounting, finance, legal, compliance, and back-office operations), still rely heavily on systems and workflows that are slow, fragmented, and outdated. 
• Manual entry, disconnected tools, inconsistent reporting, and unclear ownership of data create costly inefficiencies. And when leaders don’t have clean, timely information, decision-making becomes reactive instead of strategic. Even when better tools exist, adoption lags because change feels risky, teams feel overextended, or the short-term pain outweighs the perceived benefit. 
• Modernizing these industries is no longer optional. With the pace of business today, leaders need clear, organized, real-time information to make decisions. Industry firms that can’t deliver it will be outpaced by modern competitors who can provide the value to business owners.

The AI Revolution in Accounting and Why SMB Owners Should Care

• A study from Gartner shows 59% of finance leaders report using AI within their finance function in 2025. This is only up from 58% in 2024. These numbers include AI in planning rather than only AI already being used in operations.
• A study from Intuit shows 81% of accountants say AI improves productivity with 79% believing this gain will allow for more strategic insight for the clients. 

The Cast Takeaway

We believe the early wave of accounting firms adopting AI has happened. As the curve slows, a real gap is forming between firms modernizing their operating systems and those still relying on archaic processes. The firms putting AI front and center are still ideating but have also begun the hard work required to deliver exceptional value to business owners in the near term, and to unlock a fundamentally better way of generating insight in the long term.

At Cast, all of us believe AI’s greatest impact is creating more time and capacity for strategic guidance. Not to replace human judgment but to strengthen the stressful decision-making process business owners face. We’re excited to be building at this moment in history, and we’re committed to using AI as a tool that improves the quality of our work so we can provide true value where it matters most: helping you make better decisions.

References

Gartner, Gartner Survey Shows Finance AI Adoption Remains Steady in 2025

Intuit, Accountants Embrace AI and Strategic Advisory Services to Fuel Growth, Yet Continue to Face Tech and Talent Barriers