This article reports on what Luigi Carunchio said on the Finance, Investments and Cryptocurrencies portal, https://bit.ly/3zJru3Z, about the possible role that technology may play in the world of the liberal professions and especially analyzing the impact for Certified Public Accountants. 

"LUIGI CARUNCHIO - The digital transition is affecting multiple sectors. These include the accounting field with technologies such as business intelligence, machine learning, blockchain and smart contracts that are complementing the already well-known Electronic Invoicing, video conferencing, VPN, eLearning, digital consulting and management control. The use of these technologies is impacting the industry. To understand how and how much, we interviewed Luigi Carunchio, a member of the national board of Confprofessioni and delegate for digitization and digital innovation. 

Luigi Carunchio, many entrepreneurs and freelancers associate the word accountant with the nightmare of taxes. However, the accountant is not only in charge of notifying his client how much he has to pay to the state. In fact, there are many more tasks he or she performs. Can you give us an idea of what they are?

It is true that very often in the collective imagination the figure of the accountant is associated exclusively with the performance of tax or accounting tasks. In my opinion, this is beyond limiting both for the professional himself and for the other party, be it a business owner, another freelancer or another economic entity in general. 

I have always seen the figure of the accountant as very close to that of the American business lawyers; that is, all-around consultants who can help the client. This over time becomes a true partner, offering professional management advice related to various areas: 

• tax 
• tax
• accounting
• administrative
• corporate 
• labor 
• on extraordinary transactions 
• business organization and management control 
• on business internationalization
• on business crisis
• on professional digitization and so on. 

By now, mere accounting and tax management has become a mere commodity, and the added value is in the collateral activities managed by a professional firm

The process of Digital Transformation is now largely underway. In fact, digital technology is taking hold in so many fields, and accountants are not exempt. Electronic invoicing, video conferencing, VPN, eLearning, digital consulting, and management control have been used in the industry for some time now.Now, however, new ones such as business intelligence, machine learning, blockchain, and smart contracts are taking hold. What impact have they had and will they have for the industry? And how have they been received by industry professionals?

The impact they have had in the industry is, and will be, significant. They have changed and will change even more professional modes of operation and are creating with increasing intensity more and more business opportunities. Just think of the impact of smart contracts in business process management. so more than "how have they been received by industry professionals," I would question whether industry professionals have been willing and able to embrace these new technologies, understanding their real potential. 

In my opinion, first and foremost there must be a readiness for change, as without this there is a risk of being severely limited over the years. Professional adjustment is not only necessary, but essential. The accounting profession, like many others, is changing. These digital tools increase the speed of response to the needs of the client, who, in order to compete in a changing world, requires responsiveness as well as quality professional service

Luigi Carunchio, how do these new technologies change the way an accountant performs his duties?

I give small examples. Just think that when I started the profession, clients did not have the possibility of contact that there is now. The market has expanded geographically, and that necessarily means that we will go toward structures of professional firms organized more like businesses than the old single firms.  

We are currently in a world where time frames have gone to zero and the professional demand is to have a high quality response in the shortest possible time. Because of this, it has undoubtedly generated a need to acquire more and more specific skills and an ability to respond immediately; moreover, it has made it possible to nurture one's business constantly, optimizing the timing: for example, in the past, to get a client abroad one necessarily had to travel in person and invest resources, sometimes even unproductively. Now it is possible to take advantage of calls to plan ahead, limiting in-person meetings and making the organization of work more efficient and economical.

Staying with the theme, what advantages and disadvantages do you think the new technologies will bring to accountants?

With regard to the advantages, as also emerged from the previous responses, I believe that new technologies can bring significant management efficiencies, greater cost-effectiveness, and above all new business opportunities, whether they relate to the mere ways in which clients are acquired or to the nature of the professional assignment itself. As for the disadvantages, some traditional activities may undergo radical changes, and in general the professional who fails to be ready and prepared for the novelty may suffer major losses in terms of turnover or be forced to reinvent themselves. And firms composed of individual professionals in particular will tend to have problems.

Instead to firms that decide to invest in it and integrate it into their business plan?

For firms, I actually see many more advantages than disadvantages; in fact, I think it is vital for them to adapt to the rules of today's increasingly dynamic and globalized market: those who do not do so fall behind and lose market share, which with the recent dynamics of crisis and economic-financial difficulties are vital. A judicious use of technology can create important positives in this sense, but, as in the case of professionals, I believe that new technologies are an effective tool if at the base they remain winning ideas, the result exclusively of the human mind, a component that no technology can replace. That is why they must and will have to be a means and not an end, but a component to support entrepreneurship and the profession.

Let's get a little more specific. DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) technologies such as blockchain are designed to eliminate middlemen during exchange transactions. Which professional figures are most at risk of being replaced?

Related to the world of professions, certainly those individuals who perform methodical and repetitive tasks, for example related to tax returns or accounting, for which an artificial intelligence may replace the majority of the work done by the operator. Also in other professions, such as lawyers or technicians there will be even faster digital transition and the risk of extinction for those who do not adapt to the new way of performing their activities." 

Edited by: Luigi Alfredo Carunchio, Chartered Accountant and Statutory Auditor

For more information:

luigicarunchio@valoreassociati.it