When did the report become more important than the decision?

A few weeks ago I was in a discussion with several accountants. The conversation was about how artificial intelligence will change the profession, which reports clients want, and how those reports can be delivered faster.

After a while I asked a simple question: how many of the reports you send are actually used to take a decision?

The room went quiet.

Not because the reports were poor. On the contrary, they were thorough, accurate and professionally produced. The trouble was simply that most of them were sent after the period had closed. They described what had happened, but did little to help the client with what really matters: answering the question of what we should do now.

The biggest misconception in the finance profession

I think this is one of the biggest misconceptions in the finance profession.

For years we have made reporting steadily better. We have automated data collection, built more sophisticated dashboards and cut the time it takes to produce accounts and analysis. Even so, many leaders find they lack a basis for decisions when the most important choices come along. Not because they lack numbers, but because the numbers sit in different places, arrive in the wrong context and, quite possibly, at the wrong moment.

It is a pattern we see repeatedly in conversations with business leaders and accounting firms. The discussion rarely begins with the question "what should we do?". It begins with the question "which number is the right one?". Only once everyone agrees on which report applies can they start discussing the business itself. By then, valuable time has already gone.

That is why I believe reporting can no longer be the principal deliverable from the finance function.

Deloitte's Finance Trends 2026 points out that the finance function is moving from reporting towards strategic decision support. That is a development I recognise. But I think the shift is even more fundamental than the report describes. The real transition is not about producing better reports. It is about moving the value creation from the report to the conversation.

My contention is that a report has no value until it changes a decision. Documenting the past is all very well, but if it helps the leadership prioritise, invest, hire, reduce risk or seize an opportunity, it has done an entirely different job. That is the latter role I believe the finance function must take on.

What this means for the accounting profession

This applies to the accounting profession in the very highest degree.

I do not think the most valuable accountants of the future will be those who produce the neatest reports or the most sophisticated analyses. They will be the ones who use the finances as the starting point for a better discussion with the client. The ones who ask the questions before the client gets round to asking them. The ones who help the business see the consequences of the choices in front of it, before those choices are made.

That is a different role from the one many have traditionally held. But it is also a role that is far harder to replace. Perhaps that is why we are discussing the wrong things when we debate the finance function of the future. The debate is usually about technology, automation and new tools. All of that matters, but I do not believe it is the goal.

The goal is not better reports

The goal is better decisions.

And then the question is perhaps not how fast we can produce the next report. The question is whether the report makes the next decision easier to take. If the answer is no, then reporting is perhaps not what we should be spending most of our time improving.