What we should be teaching the next generation of professionals in accounting, wealth management, and commercial banking
For the past few decades, much of the training and career development in financial services has focused on improving efficiency, meeting regulatory compliance, and mastering technical knowledge. And for good reason: the complexity of financial regulations, client expectations, and reporting requirements has grown exponentially.
But as we now stand at the edge of another major transformation, this one driven by artificial intelligence (AI), automation, and ever-smarter software, a new skillset is urgently needed. Not more technical capability, but more humanity.
The Automation Wave Has Already Hit
AI is already reshaping financial services. In accounting, platforms like Xero and QuickBooks are automating reconciliations and report generation. In wealth management, robo-advisors can design portfolio allocations and rebalance automatically. Commercial lenders use machine learning to underwrite loans and predict defaults with staggering accuracy.
According to a McKinsey report, as much as 40% of time spent on accounting tasks can be automated with existing technologies. The World Economic Forum predicts that 44% of workers’ core skills will change by 2027. The core skills needed will be the need for empathy, communication, and leadership.
If our industry continues to train young professionals solely to follow processes and tick compliance boxes, we are preparing them to be easily replaced. You can’t out-compute a computer.
Relationships Are the Differentiator
What machines can’t do (at least not well) is build trust, ask empathetic questions, and guide people through emotionally complex decisions. This is where future professionals must focus their development.
Whether advising a family business, helping a client retire, or guiding a commercial borrower through growth, the role of today’s financial professionals should be more like that of a translator—taking data and analysis and turning it into advice that aligns with someone’s personal or business goals. And more importantly, ensuring the client understands and acts on that advice with confidence.
The best professionals won’t just explain what happened last quarter, they’ll connect the numbers to the human story behind them. They’ll ask: What does this mean for your plans? Are you comfortable with the risk? What’s changing in your life or business?
Soft Skills Are Now Core Skills
So, what exactly should we be teaching?
- Inquiry and Communication
Active listening. Open-ended questions. The ability to lead discovery conversations. These are now critical to uncovering a client’s true objectives, not just their financial needs, but their motivations and fears. - Emotional Intelligence
Clients make decisions emotionally first and rationally second. Understanding this and knowing how to guide someone through change, uncertainty, or loss is invaluable. - Contextualization
Data is only as useful as the context it’s framed in. Professionals must be taught how to interpret results in a way that’s specific, tangible, and meaningful to each client. - Adaptability
With compliance demands still growing, professionals need to balance precision with agility, knowing when to follow the rules and when to challenge legacy thinking. - Digital Fluency + Human Touch
Yes, professionals still need to understand the tools. But more importantly, they must understand how to use them in service of better relationships, not in place of them.
Reclaiming the Profession from Red Tape
In many ways, compliance and regulation have made professionals less human. Chained to checklists, many spend more time preparing for audits than they do engaging with clients. But if we keep heading down this path, we’ll find ourselves in a losing race trying to keep pace with machines that will always be faster, cheaper, and more consistent.
It’s time to redefine what makes a great financial professional. Not just someone who gets the numbers right, but someone who makes those numbers matter.
Because in the age of AI, the most irreplaceable skill isn’t technical, it’s human connection.
Author: Dave Bunce, CPA, CA