Right now, finance teams aren’t being asked to improve just one thing. They’re being asked to move faster, reduce risk, keep up with AI, support growth, tighten controls, and do it all without creating more friction for the people doing the work.
That pressure sat at the center of our recent webinar, State of Finance 2026: Expert Perspectives on What’s Changing and Why, moderated by Mark Brousseau and featuring Brendan Binkoski, a Financial Crimes Unit consultant at PwC, Marla Bennett, Manager of Accounts Payable at OrthoIllinois, Gunita Bindra, VP for Paymode Business Development at Bottomline, and Jon Titel, SVP of Product & Engineering at onPhase.
What made the discussion worth paying attention to was how grounded it felt. There was no hype and no vague forecasting, just a practical look at what finance teams are running into right now and what they should be watching more closely as 2026 takes shape.
Here were some of the biggest takeaways.
One of the clearest themes from the panel was that many finance problems don’t start where they first appear.
A late payment may look like a payment issue, a missed invoice may look like an AP issue, and a supplier complaint may look like a communication issue. But as Jon put it, “What I can’t see, I can’t fix.”
That gets to the heart of what many teams are up against, because when invoices sit in inboxes, approvals happen through side channels, or documents live across disconnected tools, it becomes much harder to spot problems early and respond before they turn into something bigger.
That’s when routine work starts turning into detective work, and it’s why the panel kept coming back to the same point: visibility isn’t just helpful anymore. It’s becoming foundational. When finance teams can see where invoices are, what’s pending, what’s approved, and where exceptions are building, they’re in a much better position to act before delays become expensive. That’s a big reason so many teams are focused on smarter workflows that give them more control.
No one was surprised that AI came up early in the webinar. It’s shaping expectations across finance, leadership, and operations. But the conversation stayed grounded in a way that felt refreshing.
Yes, AI is pushing finance teams to think differently about speed, scale, and productivity, and leaders are asking what can be automated, what can be improved, and how more can get done without adding headcount. At the same time, the panel made it clear that finance teams aren’t looking for flashy technology for the sake of it. They want AI that actually works inside real finance processes, not more noise layered onto an already messy process.
That tension came through clearly in the discussion. Jon made the point that the capabilities are real but turning them into something useful inside an actual finance process is a different challenge. The hype may be loud, but implementation is where the real work lives.
Marla brought that down to the day-to-day reality AP teams know well. AI may be “big talk” in her workplace, especially when the conversation turns to efficiency and time savings, but she was just as clear that enthusiasm comes with caution: “AI is great, but you need to have the people behind it making it do the great things for us.”
Gunita reinforced that in a way that likely reassured a lot of listeners: “AI will not replace the domain knowledge of our experts.” For teams hearing constant headlines about automation, that was an important reminder. Experience and judgment still matter, and so does the supplier side of the equation, where expectations around speed, visibility, and payment choice are continuing to rise.
That balance felt especially honest. Finance teams are interested and they’re paying attention, but they’re also asking smart questions about oversight, accountability, and where human judgment still matters most.
If there was one area where the urgency felt especially high, it was fraud.
The panel described a fraud environment that feels more sophisticated, more scalable, and in many cases more believable than what AP teams were dealing with even a few years ago. Vendor impersonation, fake banking updates, and social engineering attempts aren’t new, but what’s changing is how polished and convincing they’ve become.
Brendan gave one of the clearest warnings of the session: “What AI is not going to replace is accountability.” Technology can strengthen controls, improve consistency, and reduce manual work, but it doesn’t remove the need for human judgement. Someone still has to verify, question, and make the call.
He offered a useful framework for thinking about where risk shows up. Pointing to the fraud triangle of opportunity, rationalization, and pressure, Brendan made the case that opportunity is where finance teams can still do the most to protect themselves. When approvals drift outside the system, exceptions become routine, or controls weaken, that opening gets wider. He also flagged a newer concern that felt especially timely: deepfake voice fraud. If roughly 30 spoken words may be enough for AI to clone a voice convincingly, relying on familiarity alone becomes a much riskier bet.
Marla brought that risk back down to the day-to-day reality AP teams know well. Fraudulent emails can look legitimate, vendor spoofing attempts can feel routine, and the pressure to move quickly is always there. Her team’s answer is simple: don’t treat email alone as proof. Stop, verify, and call.
Gunita extended that same discipline into the payments side of the process, noting that supplier bank account validation is not a side detail. It’s one of the clearest due diligence questions finance teams should be asking as they think about provider risk, payment controls, and how money actually moves through the process.
That’s what made this part of the discussion especially practical. More than fear, the answer was discipline. As Brendan put it, “Approvals can’t move outside the normal systems.” That’s where risk starts to creep in.
Exceptions, informal workarounds, a rushed approval because someone’s trying to help, or a vendor change made through the wrong channel can all create openings, and openings are exactly what fraudsters look for. It’s the same kind of pressure AP teams are dealing with as cybercriminals get smarter and payment fraud gets harder to spot.
One of the most relatable parts of the webinar came when Marla described what AP looked like before automation at her organization. The process was familiar: invoices came in through the mail or by email, documents were routed physically, and people initialed paperwork. It worked for a while because that was the process the business had built around.
But as the business grew, that familiar process started showing its limits.
That’s usually when older workflows start to show their age, not all at once, but as invoice volume rises, approvers multiply, requests pile up, and follow-up starts eating up more time.
Marla’s description of life after automation was one of the clearest examples of what improvement actually feels like when it’s working: faster access to documents, easier audits, less clutter, fewer calls asking AP to dig up old invoices, more visibility for approvers, and less time spent chasing paperwork.
She summed up one of the biggest benefits in a way many AP teams would recognize right away: “It kind of lifted that weight off your shoulders.”
That line matters because finance transformation is often discussed in terms of systems and scale, but sometimes the clearest sign of progress is simply that the team no longer feels buried by the process. It also speaks to a challenge many organizations are facing right now: how to keep growing without adding more headcount.
Another strong thread from the panel was that technology is rarely the hardest part of the journey. More often, it’s the people side that determines whether change actually sticks.
Marla addressed that head-on when she talked about automation and the natural fear that can come with it. When teams hear new technology is coming, many people immediately wonder whether their role is on the line, and that concern is real. Ignoring it doesn’t make it go away.
Her team approached it differently. The goal wasn’t replacing staff. It was making room for more meaningful work and supporting growth without constantly adding manual effort.
That connects to one of the most practical lessons she shared: “Get all your stakeholders together before you are announcing this change.”
That advice was simple, but it was also one of the most useful takeaways from the conversation. Bring people in early, let them understand the why, give them context, and let them react before the rollout is already underway.
Jon built on that point from the implementation side, noting that change efforts often stall when organizations fail to account for the tribal knowledge people carry in their heads. Real life is messy, edge cases show up, and teams hit speed bumps. When goals are unclear and stakeholders aren’t aligned, every issue starts to feel bigger than it is. That’s especially true when approvals start drifting into inboxes and forwarded email threads, making the process harder to track.
This panel made one thing very clear: finance teams aren’t dealing with one isolated shift. They’re dealing with several at once. AI is changing expectations, fraud is getting harder to spot, legacy workflows are showing strain, and leadership is asking teams to handle all of it with more speed and better control.
One of the webinar poll results reinforced that point nicely. When attendees were asked which skill will matter most for finance teams over the next five years, 36% chose technology proficiency, 27% chose data analytics, and 18% chose risk management. That mix says a lot about where finance is headed. Finance teams aren’t preparing for just one kind of future anymore.
That’s a lot, but it also makes the path forward easier to see. The answer isn’t to chase every trend. It’s to build the kind of visibility, discipline, and flexibility that helps finance teams respond well as the environment changes.
Want to hear the full conversation in the panelists’ own words? Watch the on-demand recording of State of Finance 2026: Expert Perspectives on What's Changing and Why for the panel’s full perspective on visibility, fraud, AI, and what finance teams should be doing now to prepare for what’s next.