Machine learning is nearly ubiquitous in accounting operations, ERPs

The technology is mainly used to set up touch-free processes for repetitive functions such as accounts payable and receivable. Machine learning is far more integrated into accounting, planning and forecasting operations than many professionals realize, finance technology consultants said in a CFO.com webinar. A lot of the cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) and other platforms finance teams use already have machine learning built in, and that will only increase, said Kris Murphy, principal of The Hackett Group. "It's going to get to the point where ... when you enter a forecast number, the machine learning algorithm will say, 'Last time you missed by 10%, you average a miss of 8%, maybe you should think about that number,'" said Murphy. "I believe that is where we're going to be going with machine learning."