Young finance professionals expect artificial intelligence to accelerate their careers and change traditional workplace hierarchies, with nine in ten believing they will enter work more capable with AI tools than their managers or senior colleagues.
Research from Intuit found that 90% of accountancy students and early career finance professionals aged 18 to 24 feel prepared to succeed in an AI-enabled workplace. The same proportion believe they will be more capable with AI tools than more senior colleagues.
The findings point to an unusual skills dynamic for finance employers. Graduates may arrive with greater practical familiarity with generative AI than some of the people managing them, while experienced colleagues continue to hold deeper commercial, regulatory and professional knowledge.
Intuit surveyed 1,003 UK respondents aged 18 to 24, including accounting students and people studying towards or recently completing professional finance qualifications.
AI use is already embedded in the working habits of the group. Some 74% said they use AI daily or several times a day to learn, work and solve problems, while 87% believe they would work more slowly without it.
Another 89% described conversational AI tools built into financial software as extremely or very useful for analysing financial data, generating reports, answering questions and automating tasks.
Ciarán Quilty, Senior Vice President of International at Intuit, said: “For decades, professional experience naturally flowed from senior colleagues to junior employees. However AI is introducing a new dynamic where graduates arrive with greater practical familiarity with these tools, while experienced professionals continue to provide the judgement, governance and commercial context that AI cannot replace. The opportunity for firms is not choosing between experience and AI fluency, but bringing both together, encouraging learning in both directions.”
The technology could also change the work allocated at the beginning of a finance career. More than a third of respondents, 35%, expect to spend more time on higher-value tasks earlier, while 53% believe younger employees will frequently lead AI adoption within organisations.
Employers will still need to distinguish familiarity with AI from professional competence. Finance work remains subject to established controls, standards and individual accountability even when software completes part of the underlying analysis or administration.
The respondents themselves recognise that risk. Some 77% are concerned about becoming overly reliant on AI, while the same proportion have concerns about the accuracy and reliability of its outputs. Data security is an even wider concern, cited by 93%.
Those reservations carry particular weight in finance, where employees regularly handle personal, commercially sensitive and regulated information. Knowing how to use an AI tool quickly is only one part of the skill set if staff cannot judge what data can safely be entered, how an output should be checked or when a result needs to be challenged.
Glenn Collins, Head of Technical and Strategic Engagement at ACCA UK, said younger professionals’ confidence with AI created an opportunity for employers, but needed to be matched with critical thinking, sceptical validation and contextual storytelling.
That combination may alter the role of managers as automation handles more repeatable work. Reviewing outputs, coaching judgement and setting rules for responsible use could take on greater importance as routine production becomes less central to junior development.
The shift also creates a training requirement for more experienced employees. Managers do not need to outpace every graduate in day-to-day use of new tools, but they do need sufficient understanding to oversee AI-assisted work, test its conclusions and establish appropriate controls.
Finance businesses have traditionally relied on experience flowing from senior employees to junior colleagues. AI introduces a more reciprocal model, with younger recruits bringing established technology habits while experienced practitioners provide the judgement and accountability required to turn those tools into reliable professional work.
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