Artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming the finance function—but where should finance leaders start? This practical session demonstrates how CFOs and FP&A professionals can use AI to automate repetitive work, improve forecasting accuracy, accelerate reporting, and generate better business insights. Through real-world examples and practical demonstrations, participants will learn how to adopt AI responsibly while strengthening the strategic role of finance. The content draws on practical approaches demonstrated across Simon Ritchie’s FP&A and finance transformation sessions.
Course ID: PAIFT
Practical AI for Finance Teams: How CFOs and FP&A Leaders Can Use AI in Real Workflows
Learning Objectives
- Identify high-impact finance workflows where AI can improve productivity and decision-making.
- Select AI tools to support forecasting, variance analysis, scenario modeling, and financial reporting.
- Identify practical AI use cases while maintaining governance, accuracy, and financial control.
- Recall how to integrate AI into existing FP&A processes to enhance strategic business partnering.
- Recognize how to develop an action plan for implementing AI within their finance team.
Major Topics
- Why spreadsheet-heavy FP&A workflows slow down modern finance teams
- The shift from traditional FP&A to AI-enabled and agentic FP&A
- How finance can move from manual data manipulation to more strategic advisory work
- The changing role of AI in planning, reporting, forecasting, and variance analysis
- The journey from chat-based AI to copilots, agents, and multi-agent finance workflows
- How AI can support continuous forecasting, autonomous data gathering, self-generating commentary, and scenario modelling
- The FP&A performance management loop: data collection, reporting, forecasting, and strategic decision support
- Why legacy planning tools often fail to keep pace with modern business needs
- Practical considerations for trusted data, governance, auditability, human review, and finance controls
- Operational actions finance teams can take to begin building an AI-enabled finance function
Who Should Attend
CFOs Finance Directors FP&A Professionals Financial Controllers Finance Managers Business Finance Partners Accountants interested in AI Finance Transformation Leaders
Fields of Study
Information TechnologyPrerequisites
- The evolving role of AI in modern finance
- AI-assisted forecasting and financial planning
- Faster variance analysis using AI Scenario modelling and decision support
- AI-powered management reporting
- Prompt engineering for finance professionals
- Governance, accuracy and risk considerations
- Practical AI tools every finance team can start using immediately