Finance leaders on how their teams use AI
Video interviews with CFOs and finance leaders about how their teams use AI: what they automate, what they build or buy, and what they leave alone. Buyer guides, vendor news and prices are below.
Start with your job
Three places to start, based on your role.
- CFO
Where the money goes, what to build and what to buy.
- Controller
Payables, receivables and the close, and the controls around them.
- FP&A lead
Planning tools, the forecast and the data underneath.
Buyer guides
Each guide compares the tools for one finance job. It shows the price where it is public, the AI features, what each tool connects to, recent news and the catch.
Read the guides
Best AI agents for accounting and finance
Which finance AI agent fits: agents on top of your systems, a ledger with agents built in, or agents inside your ERP suite.
Best AI tools for month-end close
Compare AI close tools on flux drafts, auto-reconciliation and close checklists run by agents.
Top 6 tools for accounts payable automation
From vendor invoice to payment. Which tools publish prices, and which accounting systems each one syncs with.
Top 6 AI tools for FP&A teams
Planning tools for large enterprises, and tools for teams that stay in Excel or Google Sheets.
Best AI solutions for NetSuite
Compare NetSuite's own Ask Oracle with add-on tools for billing, AP, the close and integrations.
Best reconciliation automation software
Compare tools for high-volume matching, exception handling and AI agents across bank, card and intercompany data.
Top 6 AI assistants for finance teams
Six AI assistants compared on price, data controls and spreadsheet work.
Top 6 ERP systems for mid-market companies
Cloud ERPs for companies that have outgrown entry-level accounting, and which let outside AI assistants connect.
Interviews with finance leaders
Conversations with finance leaders from SeatGeek, NetSuite, Vivino, Verdant and many more.
AI Is a Leadership Challenge
Anders Liu-LindbergPartner, Implement Consulting Group
Anders calls AI in finance a leadership challenge. He explains why companies are pausing finance transformation and how budgets and forecasts should work with AI.
Notes and chapters-
25 minTo AI or Not? Token Costs and Build vs Buy
Teddy CollinsEVP of Finance, SeatGeek
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25 minERP: Buy vs Build?
Craig SullivanGroup VP of Product Management, NetSuite
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25 minYou Can't Cut Your Way to Better Margins
Samantha Singer-GuindiCFO, controller and director of finance in hospitality
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27 minThe Missing Pillar in FP&A
Paul BarnhurstThe FP&A Guy
Finance software news
The newest releases, deals and changes from the vendors in the guides. Each item shows its date.
- 5 Nov 2026
Hyperbots
Hyperbots published a post describing its Business Central connector, the data it reads and writes, and the setup steps.
In the Business Central AI guide - 5 Nov 2026
Allvue Portfolio Monitoring
BPM selected Allvue as the technology foundation for its fund administration practice.
In the PE portfolio reporting guide - 4 Nov 2026
Fivetran
Fivetran was named a Leader in the 2026 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Data Integration Tools.
In the Finance data integration guide - 3 Nov 2026
Suplari
Docusign announced it is acquiring Suplari to add procurement intelligence to its Intelligent Agreement Management platform.
In the Spend analytics guide - 3 Nov 2026
MRI Property Management X
MRI expanded Agora with new intelligence, workflow automation and voice features.
In the Property accounting guide - Nov 2026
FreshBooks
FreshBooks listed a connector for ChatGPT among its November 2026 changes.
In the Small business accounting guide
Prices vendors have published
About half of the tools in the guides publish a price. The rest sell by quote, and each guide says which.
| Tool | Published price | Guide |
|---|---|---|
| Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central | $80 (Essentials) or $110 (Premium) per user a month, annual | Mid-market ERP |
| BILL Accounts Payable | $49 to $89 per user a month, plus payment fees; Enterprise by quote | AP automation |
| Ramp Bill Pay | Free plan; Plus $15 per user a month plus a platform fee | AP automation |
| Jirav | $10,000 a year (Starter), $15,000 (Pro) | Budgeting and forecasting |
| Microsoft 365 Copilot | $30 per user a month (annual) | AI assistants |
| Microsoft Power BI | Pro $14, Premium Per User $24 per user a month (annual) | Data warehouse tools |
| IBM Process Mining | From $4,250 a month (SaaS) or $2,885 (on premises) | Process mining |
| MarginEdge | $350 per location a month | Restaurant and hospitality accounting |
Ask this before you sign
Each guide ends with questions to ask the vendor. Here are six of them.
Which AI agents come with the per-user price, and which run on credits or a separate subscription?
From the Mid-market ERP guideWhich of the agents you just showed are available to every customer today, and which are in preview or marked coming soon?
From the AI tools for FP&A guideWhat are the per-invoice and per-payment fees on top of the subscription?
From the AP automation guideWhat will year one cost at our invoice volume, in writing?
From the AR and collections guideDoes this cost figure come from the provider invoice or from token counts and public prices?
From the AI and token spend guideHow will the bill change as our row counts and query volume grow?
From the Data warehouse tools guide
What finance leaders have learned from using AI
Lessons from finance leaders who have used AI in their work. Each one comes with the reasoning behind it.
Do not use AI for work that follows fixed rules
If a task follows the same steps every time, regular software can do it. SeatGeek keeps AI for work nobody had time for.
Teddy CollinsEVP of Finance, SeatGeek
Building your own ERP costs more than the build
Craig Sullivan asks what that effort, from AI or people, would produce if it went into running the business instead.
Craig SullivanGroup VP of Product Management, NetSuite
Ledger data is too messy to forecast from
Accounting numbers include adjustments and delays. Better forecasts also need data on what is happening in the business.
Paul BarnhurstThe FP&A Guy
AI is weaker on numbers than CFOs expect, and stronger elsewhere
AI can struggle with complicated financial models, but it can save time on meeting preparation, emails and follow-up.
Chris OrtegaFractional CFO and CEO, Fresh FP&A
Annual budgets go stale by February
After all the December work, the budget is already off by February. Jason Yocum would keep a live monthly forecast instead.
Jason YocumFractional CFO; previously CFO, Vivino
Make the close and the budget run all year
Instead of a few rushed days, Caitlin Haberberger wants finance teams to spread the close and the budget across the year.
Caitlin HaberbergerCFO, Verdant, and investor
What finance leaders keep coming back to
The same questions come up in conversation after conversation. Here is where each one is discussed.
Build, buy or leave it alone
SeatGeek's finance team builds some tools and buys others. NetSuite's Craig Sullivan asks how much time building your own software takes away from running the business.
Keep the math on fixed rules
Paul Barnhurst says number work needs a deterministic solution, one that gives the same answer every time. Teddy Collins keeps repeatable data work out of AI, so his team does not spend tokens on it.
Why transformation projects fail
Vin Messina, Ilana Esterrich and Jason Yocum each explain why most finance transformations fail and what to do differently.
Budgets and the annual cycle
Caitlin Haberberger on budgeting red flags. Jason Yocum on the death of budgeting.
The junior analyst
Teddy Collins on the future of the junior analyst.
Finance on the floor
Samantha Singer-Guindi on leaving the desk to work next to operations. She also explains why every line of a hospitality P&L moves together.
In their words
“It's not a technology challenge, it's a leadership challenge.”
Anders Liu-LindbergPartner, Implement Consulting GroupWatch the interview“It's a large language model. It's not a large math model.”
Paul BarnhurstThe FP&A GuyWatch the interview“With food waste, you are literally taking your margins and throwing them in the garbage.”
Samantha Singer-GuindiFinance leader in hospitalityWatch the interview“You don't have a technology problem, you have a story problem.”
Vin MessinaCo-author of an upcoming book on finance transformationWatch the interviewBe a guest
Guests so far include CFOs, VPs of finance, an ERP product leader and FP&A advisers. If you run a finance team and have put AI to work, or chosen not to, pitch a conversation.