Polly Thompson
6 min read
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The Big Four dominate the professional services industry.
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AI may disrupt not just job roles but also their organizational, business, and pricing structures.
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Meanwhile, some midsize firms say they're better placed to adapt quickly and benefit from AI.
The Big Four — Deloitte, PwC, EY, and KPMG — are a select and powerful few. They dominate the professional services industry and have done so for decades.
But all empires fall eventually. Large corporations tend to merge, transform, or get replaced by the latest wave of innovative upstarts.
It's hard to see that time coming for the Big Four. With huge revenues, international reach, vast workforces, and numerous service offerings, they're indispensable for many corporations.
Yet AI could be poised to disrupt their business models, organizational structure, and employees' day-to-day roles, while driving opportunities for the midmarket.
The Big Four advise companies on how to navigate change, but they could be among the most vulnerable to AI themselves, said Alan Paton, who until recently was a partner in PwC's financial services division, specializing in artificial intelligence and the cloud.
Paton, now the CEO of Qodea, a Google Cloud solutions consultancy, told Business Insider he's a firm believer that AI-driven automation would bring major disruption to key service lines and drive "a huge reduction" in profits.
Most structured, data-heavy tasks in audit, tax, and strategic advisory, Paton said, will be automated within the next three to five years, eliminating about 50% of roles. There are already examples of AI solutions capable of performing 90% of the audit process, he added.
Paton said automation could mean clients increasingly question why they should pay consultants big money to "give me an answer I can get instantaneously from a tool."
Unless they become far more specialized, the Big Four will be in trouble, he said.
Others are less convinced AI will make consultants and accountants obsolete, arguing that AI will instead free up time and drive productivity.
"AI frees up consultants, but it will never replace them," said Casey Foss, the chief commercial officer at the midsize firm West Monroe.
Businesses will continue to require expertise as AI develops — it's not a "set it and forget it" solution, she said. There will always be a need for the human in the loop who can understand problems holistically and has the "expertise of the gut feel," she added.
The debate over how AI will disrupt job roles affects all consulting firms, but some industry insiders say the Big Four's business model is also at risk.
