There were over 30,000 mentions of AI on earnings calls by the end of 2023 as C-suite leaders gird for a ‘massive technology shift’

Since the November 2022 release of ChatGPT, a form of generative AI, mentions of the tech on earnings calls have skyrocketed, according to Accenture’s new Technology Vision 2024 report. In Q1 2022, there were approximately 500 mentions, and by Q3 2023, there were more than 30,000. Accenture Research conducted an analysis of more than 70,000 S&P Global earnings transcripts across 10,452 companies from January 2022 to September 2023.

Courtesy of Accenture

There’s a reason why you’re hearing so much about AI and generative AI, according to Accenture: It’s going to reinvent business as we know it.

Yusuf Tayob, group chief executive of Accenture Operation, shared with me his assessment: “2024 will be the year we’ll see larger, scaled enterprise application of generative AI, as leading companies look to effectively manage the reinvention required by this massive technology shift.”

Where AI once focused more on the automation of routine tasks, there’s been a shift toward changing how we approach work. Technology like generative AI is “rapidly democratizing” specialized knowledge work previously “reserved for the highly trained or deep-pocketed,” according to the report.

Accenture shared with me CFO-specific data from its report: Among the 375 finance chiefs surveyed, 97% agreed that making technology more human will expand opportunities in every industry—and the same percentage said generative AI would force their organization to modernize its tech architecture. Also, more than a third (39%) of CFOs anticipate that over the next three years generative AI chatbots will lead to a transformational change in their organization’s business processes.

With potential productivity enhancements across nearly a thousand different types of jobs, Accenture noted in the report, we’re heading toward a future where more employees have jobs that require AI than jobs that don’t.

And CFOs get this. Katie Rooney, global CFO and COO of Alight Solutions, anticipates that AI will play “an even more crucial role” in shaping the future of work and employee experience in 2024, she recently told me. “For organizations,” Rooney said, “developing strategies to define the right priorities and assemble the right teams for effective transformation will be critical.”

Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com

Leaderboard

Vikram Luthar, CFO and SVP at ADM (NYSE: ADM), a provider of human and animal nutrition products, was placed on administrative leave, effective immediately. "Luthar’s leave is pending an ongoing investigation being conducted by outside counsel for ADM and the board’s audit committee regarding certain accounting practices and procedures with respect to ADM’s Nutrition reporting segment, including as related to certain intersegment transactions," according to ADM's announcement on Sunday. ADM is cooperating with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Ismael Roig was named interim CFO at ADM. Roig most recently served both as president of EMEA at ADM, where he had oversight of all of ADM’s business activities in EMEA, and as president of animal nutrition, a position he was appointed to in late 2022.

John Way was named CFO at UpStream, a provider of managed services for senior health care. Way succeeds Brendan Shanahan as CFO. Way's career includes leadership roles in organizations such as United Health Group, Proto Labs, and Virtual Radiologic.

Big deal

ISACA has released its Privacy in Practice 2024 survey report. The global professional association has surveyed more than 1,300 professionals around the world who work in data privacy roles. They weighed in on privacy topics including organization structure, staffing, budgets, and training.

A key finding is regarding funding for data privacy—43% of respondents considered their organization’s privacy budgets underfunded. Just 36% say their budget is appropriately funded. Meanwhile, only 24% say that they expect the budget will increase this year (down 10 points from last year), and only one percent say it will remain the same (down 26 points from last year), according to ISACA. 

Going deeper

"Mars senior executive reveals his best career hack for climbing the corporate ladder: ‘Stop fixating on that promotion. Worry about learning, not your next job,'" is a new Fortune article by Orianna Rosa Royle. It’s more important to focus your energy on finding out what energizes you when you're at the bottom of the career ladder, according to Shaid Shah, the global president of Mars Food & Nutrition.  

Overheard

"The AI PC is coming this year. And it's going to be probably one of the biggest changes in the PC industry since the PC was invented more than 20 years ago. It'll allow customers to run AI applications locally."

—HP CEO Enrique Lores told Yahoo Finance Live during WEF 2024 regarding advances in artificial intelligence.