AI in Professional Services: 69% Are Already Using or Exploring AI to Win Back Time
Professional services firms must balance rising client expectations with the need to protect margins, improve forecasting, and make better use of their people’s time. With expertise at the heart of the business model, every hour spent on administration rather than client value has a direct impact on performance.
At the same time, firms are managing increasingly complex projects, fragmented data, and growing demands for faster, more informed decisions. AI offers an opportunity to ease those pressures, not by replacing human expertise, but by helping people apply their knowledge, judgment, and experience where they create the most value for clients.
Giving time back in an industry where time is the business model
For professional services firms, time is more than a measure of productivity. It is the foundation of the business model. Every hour spent searching for information, reconciling data, coding invoices, or building status reports is time that could be focused on solving client challenges, strengthening relationships, or improving delivery outcomes.
Recent webinar poll results show that firms are already looking to AI to help win back that time. In total, 69% of respondents said they are using AI regularly, using it occasionally, or actively exploring it. While only 3% said AI is already embedded in their processes and 12% said they are not using it today, the results point to both strong momentum and significant untapped potential.
That potential is closely linked to the industry’s day-to-day pressures. 41% of respondents identified reducing administrative workload as the greatest opportunity for AI to support their organization, followed by improving employee productivity and providing better insights for decision-making, each at 28%. AI can help firms act on these priorities by reducing routine work and making better use of the data already held across projects, people, and finance.
Why the foundation matters
AI works best when it is grounded in trusted data, connected processes, and clear governance. Adding AI on top of fragmented systems can make complexity move faster rather than remove it. For AI to support better decisions, professional services organizations first need a strong operational foundation, one that connects financial, project, and people information in a consistent way.
With that foundation in place, AI can help leaders understand what is happening, anticipate what is likely to happen next, and act with greater confidence.
Two ways AI can support professional services firms
First, AI can help organizations run more efficiently. By working with trusted ERP data, AI can reduce manual administration, support better resource decisions, and give leaders earlier visibility into cost, cash, project performance, and margins. While only 4% of respondents selected resource planning and utilization as the greatest potential area today, it remains a critical use case for firms looking to improve delivery outcomes and profitability.
Second, AI can help firms deliver better client service. By bringing project updates together, highlighting delivery risks earlier, and giving teams the context they need to act, AI can help firms protect project outcomes and strengthen client confidence.
Practical AI capabilities available today
Unit4 is focused on applying AI to real business processes where it can reduce friction and improve everyday work. Examples include AI-supported invoice coding, task approvals, real-time help, expense receipt recognition, payslip querying and enabling stronger performance through 1:1 meetings.
For finance teams, account prediction can suggest coding for supplier invoices based on historical information, helping reduce manual effort while keeping users in control. For employees and managers, Ava can support tasks and approvals directly in Microsoft Teams, helping people take action without moving between systems.
In talent and performance processes, AI can help summarize review conversations and support objective creation, reducing administrative effort while improving consistency and clarity. It can also help employees query payslip detail, reducing burden on HR teams.
From automation to reasoning
The next stage of AI in ERP is not simply about completing tasks faster. It is about moving toward systems that can reason over business context, understand the relationships between data, and support safer, more informed decision-making.
For a professional services CFO, that could mean asking a natural language question such as, “Do we have active projects that are overdue?” and receiving an answer that not only identifies the relevant projects, but also explains the reasoning behind each result. A follow-up question could then connect project status to unbilled revenue, helping teams move from insight to action faster.
Keeping people in control
For AI to be valuable in business-critical processes, it must be trusted, explainable, and governed. Professional services firms need to remain in control of what AI can do, what actions require approval, and how decisions can be reviewed or audited.
That is why Unit4’s approach is focused on AI that works within the boundaries set by each organization. The goal is not automation for its own sake. It is to help people work more effectively while maintaining confidence, accountability, and control.
The opportunity ahead
AI has the potential to help professional services firms reduce administration, improve productivity, strengthen decision-making, and give more time back to the people whose expertise clients value most. The firms that combine AI with human judgment, industry knowledge, and trusted data will be best positioned to work smarter, deliver stronger outcomes, and create more value over time.
A commitment-free way to explore AI – sign up today
Ready to see what AI could deliver for your organization? Watch our on-demand webinar recording for practical examples, product insights, and guidance on taking the next step with AI in a trusted and purposeful way.
Existing Unit4 ERP customers can also sign up for our AI for Your World campaign and try selected AI capabilities commitment-free until Aug. 31, 2027, when registering by Dec. 31, 2026.
For the 33% of respondents currently exploring AI, and the many already experimenting with it, this is a practical opportunity to test AI in real workflows, identify the most valuable use cases, and build confidence before making longer-term decisions.