As finance teams explore AI and automation, an important hiring question is emerging: who has the expertise to turn the possibilities into processes that work? At Talentedge, we’ve been discussing this for some time and we touched on this subject during our AI in Finance podcast earlier this year.
Would AI lead businesses to create entirely new positions within finance? Would existing roles evolve? And what skills would employers need to bring into their teams?
Over the last six months, we’ve started to see part of the answer through the hiring requirements coming to us.
Some businesses are bringing technology specialists into their finance teams to help automate transactional processes. These professionals haven’t necessarily built their careers in finance. Their core expertise is in building workflows, connecting systems and implementing automation that works reliably in everyday operations.
For employers considering similar hires, that distinction is important.
What Do Technology Specialists Bring to a Finance Team?
Identifying a process that could be automated is one thing. Designing and implementing the solution requires a different set of skills.
A finance team may recognise that a process involves repetitive data entry, manual checks or information moving between disconnected systems. But addressing it can require someone who understands how those systems interact, how to structure the workflow and how to handle the situations where the standard process breaks down.
Depending on the scope of the role, that work could include:
- Connecting finance systems with other business platforms.
- Building workflows that reduce manual processing.
- Implementing AI tools where they serve a clear purpose.
- Designing how exceptions are identified and passed to the right person.
- Testing, monitoring and maintaining the automation.
The requirement is therefore more specific than finding someone who is confident using AI. It is about hiring someone who can design and deliver a working solution around the needs of the finance function.
Finance Knowledge Still Matters
Technical capability alone doesn’t define a successful hire.
Finance processes come with requirements around accuracy, approvals, controls and accountability. A workflow needs to reflect those requirements, including what happens when information is incomplete, a transaction needs further investigation or a decision requires human judgement.
This makes the relationship between the technology specialist and the finance team essential.
Finance professionals understand the transactions, the exceptions and the controls. They know why a process exists and where mistakes could have consequences. The technology specialist brings the expertise to build a solution around that knowledge.
Employers need to consider how effectively a candidate can work with finance colleagues: asking the right questions, understanding the reasoning behind a process and explaining technical choices clearly.
How Should Employers Define These Roles?
Before deciding on a job title or candidate profile, it helps to establish what the person will be responsible for delivering.
Is the immediate priority to automate a particular transactional process? Connect existing systems? Assess opportunities across the finance function? Or maintain and improve automation that has already been introduced?
Those are different requirements, and they can call for different experience.
A useful hiring brief should make clear:
- Which processes and systems the person will work with.
- What they will need to build or implement themselves.
- How they will work with finance, IT and other stakeholders.
- Who will own the solution once it is in use.
- How success will be assessed.
Clarity here helps employers distinguish between someone who can identify opportunities, someone who can lead a transformation project and someone with the technical skills to build the automation.
It also helps determine how much previous finance experience is essential, and where a strong technical specialist could develop the necessary understanding through working closely with the team.
Bringing Finance and Technology Recruitment Together
For Talentedge, these requirements are bringing our finance and technology recruitment expertise closer together.
Understanding the finance environment is essential to defining the role. Assessing the technical capability is equally important to finding someone who can deliver it.
That combination helps us look beyond a job title and understand both the work that needs to be done and the environment in which the person will be doing it.
We’re still early in seeing how these teams will develop. Existing finance roles will continue to evolve, and businesses will make different choices about where technical expertise sits.
But one answer to our original discussion is becoming clearer: some of the new roles within finance will be filled by people whose careers began outside it.
Looking to hire expertise for finance automation? Talentedge’s finance and technology recruitment teams can help you define the role and find the capability your business needs.
