Now the target is moving. Over the past five years, much of finance transformation has focused on making consolidation, planning and reporting faster and more efficient. But AI has shifted the goalposts. Finance leaders can no longer just ask how to close, plan and report faster, they need to ask what finance should be doing when technology can increasingly perform the work that once consumed so much of its time.
The old playbook is running out of road
Traditional finance transformation has followed a familiar path: implement an EPM or CPM platform, redesign the processes, then help people adapt. The result is usually a better version of the existing finance function, with faster consolidation, more automated reconciliations and more sophisticated planning.
But if AI can increasingly automate, interrogate and explain much of that activity, efficiency alone is no longer enough. The question isn't just, “How do we do this better?” but, “Should we still be doing it this way at all?” That changes the role of finance. Teams can move from chasing reconciliations, manual eliminations and line-by-line budgets to investigating exceptions, challenging the numbers and stress-testing assumptions.
AI makes the foundations more important
There is a dangerous assumption that if the numbers balance, the data must be accurate. In reality, balanced figures can still sit on flawed data, and adding AI will not fix that. It risks turning weak foundations into faster, more confident-looking outputs. That makes data governance, ownership and control more important than ever.
A new platform doesn't automatically create transformation
A new consolidation or planning platform can automate the old playbook faster, but that does not make it transformation. Automated matching can accelerate the close, and driver-based models can accelerate budgeting, but if the same assumptions carry forward unchallenged, the process has not fundamentally changed. That is migration, not transformation.
Build the roadmap around value
If the target is moving, a fixed multi-year roadmap can quickly become a constraint. CFOs need a transformation plan that evolves with the technology and the business.
At Cofiniti, we help clients build transformation in waves,with each stage delivering measurable value while creating space to reassess what comes next.
The journey moves from Discovery, through to Recommendations and Scope, towards Design and Implementation. Each stage answers the same question: are we building on reliable foundations, removing unnecessary manual work, turning data into insight, and ultimately helping finance anticipate what comes next?
The point isn't to automate for automation's sake. It's to create a finance function that spends less time processing information and more time using it to challenge assumptions, understand what is changing and make better decisions.
The questions CFOs should be asking
Before adding another AI capability or technology layer, ask:
· Are our data, governance and controls strong enough to support AI responsibly?
· Are we using AI to solve a genuine business problem, or simply automating an inefficient process?
· Are the people closest to the close and forecast helping shape what comes next?
And perhaps the most important question:
What can our existing EPM or CPM platform already do with AI?
If the answer is no, you may have a technology programme rather than a transformation programme.
The target has moved
Finance transformation has spent years making the existing function better. AI creates the opportunity to move into its next phase. If your roadmap was written before AI became a practical reality, it may still be the right roadmap, but it deserves another look.
At Cofiniti, we are not here to replace what is already working. We are here to make sure the next 6, 12 and 18 months are aimed at the right target. The biggest risk is not that your transformation programme runs late. It is that you deliver exactly what you planned, only to realise you have transformed yesterday’s finance function.
Using a collaborative approach, we deliver value-driven solutions, harmonising people, process, data and technology.
