Accounting’s AI Boom Is Widening the Experience Gap

Any CFO with a pulse knows AI is taking over accounting’s grunt work, but the experience needed to take responsibility for its output still doesn’t come with an “automate” button. 

That conundrum is creating a training problem for finance and accounting: If software takes over the assignments junior accountants once learned on, how do those employees develop the judgment to catch its mistakes?

For Erik Nakamura, CFO of Daily Journal, which publishes California’s largest legal newspaper and operates court software business Journal Technologies, the rise of AI reinforces the value of accounting experience.

Nakamura began his career in KPMG’s audit and tax practices before moving into corporate finance, including financial reporting through real estate brokerage ZipRealty’s IPO and work on e-commerce software company Nogin’s SPAC process. He has also built finance teams, giving him experience developing accountants and overseeing work subject to public-company scrutiny.

“AI makes accounting knowledge and judgment more valuable because someone still has to determine whether the output is right,” Nakamura said in an interview with CFO Upside. “A polished answer is not necessarily a correct one.”

Jack Castonguay, an associate professor of accounting at Hofstra University, sees the other side of that expectation. He told CFO Upside that students entering the profession need opportunities to develop judgment before employers can reasonably expect them to exercise it.

“With accounting firms adopting and deploying AI across many of the tasks junior accountants would have traditionally performed, firms will need to get creative in getting the accountants the experience they need to be able to challenge and review the AI in a low-risk environment,” Castonguay said.

Learning to Review

Hiring fewer junior accountants also raises a question about how firms will develop experienced ones. Business Insider reported in August 2025 that an internal PwC presentation projected reducing US junior associate hiring by roughly one-third by 2028, with AI and offshoring among the factors. The projection illustrates the challenge Castonguay describes: Firms are cutting the roles where accountants traditionally learned the work, even as they still need people who know enough to review it. 

The training question becomes clearer when you look at what AI already handles inside a finance department. At Daily Journal, Nakamura said his finance function has found AI useful in preparatory work around the accounting close, SEC compliance and FP&A. Applications include organizing information and preparing presentations, helping the team reach an initial draft or analysis faster.

The review still requires people who understand the underlying accounting, he said.

“Does the analysis reconcile [with] the underlying data? Is the accounting treatment appropriate? Does an apparent exception reflect a real issue or incomplete information?” Nakamura said. “The time savings do not eliminate review; they change where the effort goes.”

That shift, he noted, has implications for hiring. Nakamura values a CPA background and hands-on accounting experience because they help employees recognize missing context and evaluate results.

“The credential matters, but so does demonstrated judgment,” he said. “I want people who can use technology effectively and know when to challenge it.”

In Castonguay’s view, developing that judgment requires practice. He expects simulations, including mock audits and tax returns, to become a larger part of training as firms rethink the work assigned to junior staff.

“I’ve seen comparisons to how pilots often learn to fly on flight simulators before practicing in a real plane and we will need to do the same with accounting,” he said. “That way they can understand what the AI is doing and know where common issues or errors could occur.”

He sees a role for universities in building that experience before students reach their first jobs. Accounting programs, he said, should work with firms to design simulated assignments students can complete during the semester.

“They understand that they can’t know what the AI did wrong or missed if they don’t know what the correct option is to begin with,” Castonguay said.

Taking the Bumpers Down

Castonguay worries that students who use AI to produce correct answers may mistake that success for an understanding of the accounting principles behind them, leaving gaps in their knowledge that only become apparent when they have to work without the tool.

“Students use AI as a crutch,” he said.

He compares that reliance to bowling with bumper guards, where the assistance can make someone appear more capable than they are when it is removed. Students who expect AI to remain available throughout their careers may see less reason to master the underlying work themselves.

For employers, that raises a practical question about how to distinguish a candidate’s knowledge from the quality of the tools they use.

“To see if they understand you have to give them case studies or questions to solve without AI and see how they perform,” Castonguay said. “This probably should occur at the interview stage and then continue on the job. It should be both a performance measurement and a learning opportunity.”

Asked where employers see the biggest gap between their expectations and graduates’ preparation, Castonguay pointed to critical thinking. He emphasized that the issue predates AI, although he believes the technology is making it worse.

His students nevertheless remain interested in traditional audit and tax careers. He said they anticipate reviewing work AI performs, potentially taking on responsibilities previously associated with more experienced staff.

“The work is changing and it’s going to require them to know more, not less,” he said.

Please Use Responsibly: For Nakamura, faster preparation still leaves finance teams responsible for determining whether the information is complete and the conclusions hold up. “AI can assist with gathering information, preparing drafts and reducing repetitive work, but responsibility for the accounting does not move to the tool,” he said.