EY CEO says AI won't decrease its 400,000-person workforce — but it might help it double in size
Speaking Monday at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles, Truncale said, "We're not going to decrease the size of our workforce" because AI increases productivity, and employees perform at a higher level earlier in their careers.
Her 400,000-person firm works with the biggest companies in the world, but the data-heavy work required of auditors and accountants has led many to predict that firms like EY can do the same amount of work with fewer people, thanks to AI.
Truncale believes AI "is going to transform the work our people are doing," but not make humans obsolete or eliminate thousands of jobs.
"There's always going to be a human component," she said.
"You have to invest in all of the soft skills," she added.
Naturally, the firm is talking with companies in various sectors about AI tools they can incorporate into their firms. EY is able to connect with these executive teams because the firm is "client zero" and tests many tools on its own workforce and "disrupting ourselves" before recommending them to clients, Truncale said.
There's a healthy respect for these tools given teams across the firm are constantly tinkering with them — of both the tools' abilities and faults. Data, Truncale said, and data security need to be top of mind for executives who want to harness AI.
"You've got to be really careful with this technology," she said.
While generative AI has disrupted professional services, many in the industry have echoed Truncale and said they do not think it can replace humans entirely but instead serve as a supplement to their work.
EY and the other Big Four firms have invested heavily in AI for years and recently in agentic AI, which involves several AI "agents" operating independently and making decisions without the direct assistance or input of humans.
In March, EY launched its EY.ai Agentic Platform in March, providing 80,000 of its tax employees with 150 tax agents that can help them with data collection, document analysis and review, and income and indirect tax compliance.
Other firms and consultants have also said they view AI as a way to free up staff from monotonous tasks and give them additional time to spend on more advanced or complicated work. AI has been a boon to consulting firms' business as clients look for guidance on how to incorporate the technology.
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NBC News
24 minutes ago
- NBC News
What's behind the TikTok accounts using AI-generated versions of real Latino journalists?
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"There are things that are impossible to stop, and we can't stop artificial intelligence right now," Ramos said in his video. "There are tons of videos of me where I'm supposedly saying things I have never said." The accounts point to the challenge of stopping or controlling the surge in fake images and misinformation as AI technology advances and is increasingly used by those who want to spread false information online. Alexios Mantzarlis, director of the Security, Trust, and Safety Initiative at Cornell Tech, Cornell University's graduate campus in New York City, found 88 TikTok accounts that routinely used AI-generated versions of Ramos and other Latino news anchors from the Spanish-language networks Telemundo and Televisa to spread misinformation online targeting Spanish-speaking audiences in the United States. NBC News reviewed the contents of the 88 accounts before TikTok shut them down after it learned of Mantzarlis' findings. Most of the 88 accounts were created this year and used AI avatars of Ramos, Noticias Telemundo and NBC News anchor José Díaz-Balart and Televisa anchor Enrique Acevedo. (Telemundo and NBC News are owned by NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast Corp.) Their AI avatars, some of which were more realistic than others, were used to front false stories about divisive topics such as immigration, as well as conspiracy theories about Trump, Jeffrey Epstein and Sean "Diddy" Combs. The most recent videos posted by the now-deleted accounts had the AI avatars talk about a fabricated story of an orca attack that went viral and a nonexistent curfew for children based on a false law authorizing the abduction of children in the United States. The comments on a video about the false storyline fronted by Acevedo's AI avatar showed that while some users seem to have identified the content as false, other expressed distress over it, suggesting they believed the misinformation being spread. "These deepfakes hijack my voice, my image, and — more importantly — the trust I've built with audiences over the years. I'm leaning on transparency, calling them out publicly, but the scale of this threat is bigger than any one journalist," Acevedo told Mantzarlis, who wrote about his findings on his . A TikTok spokesperson told NBC News in a statement that the company 'banned these accounts for violating our Community Guidelines and continue[s] to vigilantly protect our platform from harmful misinformation and deceptive AI-generated content." Mantzarlis said there are probably hundreds more such accounts on the platform. He first began researching the trend more than six months ago. In March, Mantzarlis discovered a network of nearly 40 TikTok accounts posing as Telemundo and Univision that used AI-generated content and the voices of well-known professional journalists to spread misinformation about topics that tend to go viral on social media. The accounts went undetected for about a month before TikTok shut them down. But the trends Mantzarlis found on TikTok have evolved as more social media platforms integrate AI tools into their apps, making it easier to generate credible AI avatars, he told NBC News. Based on his research, Mantzarlis said the creators behind such TikTok accounts are constantly trying different ways to generate content that creates large viewership numbers to accumulate at least 10,000 followers — which is the minimum required to monetize videos under TikTok's Creator Rewards Program. The creators have 'determined that sensationalist news in Spanish, targeting a U.S. audience, does numbers, so they'll try to feed that niche,' he said. That's why some of them have even used AI-generated versions of non-native Spanish speakers — including a Brazilian journalist and comedians from 'The Daily Show,' an American satirical TV program — to spread Spanish-language misinformation. Mantzarlis said he found "very strong evidence" suggesting that such TikTok accounts are being built up to garner enough followers to monetize their videos. The monetized TikTok accounts are then sold to other people "who can change the topic and theme and find another niche' they can profit from. Mantzarlis found an encrypted chat group managed by Brazilian TikTok creators who claimed to sell monetized social media accounts that came pre-loaded with AI-generated clickbait content. In it, he saw someone claim to be selling a monetized TikTok account named "Tv Telemundo" for 300 Brazilian reals, or about $55. The account had posted AI-generated news and religious content to gain 11,000 followers under the previous name. The account now shares AI-generated wellness content. Marta Planells, Telemundo's vice president of digital news and streaming, told NBC News that the network has been reporting TikTok accounts impersonating Telemundo and their anchors for over a year. 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Forbes
an hour ago
- Forbes
5 ChatGPT Prompts To Help You Perform Business Analysis
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Prompt: "Here is an overview of my business [brief description]Explanation: Ideal for marketing executives and strategists, this prompt helps ChatGPT quantify market position through direct metrics such as market share. It can then offer insights into strategically positioning your business distinctly against competitors. ChatGPT's suggestions on clear messaging can help ensure your differentiation resonates effectively with customers. Prompt: "Analyze these recent customer feedback scores for my business: Net Promoter Score (NPS) of X, Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) score of Y%, and Customer Effort Score (CES) of Z. Identify specific areas negatively affecting customer satisfaction, and provide targeted strategies to significantly improve these scores." Explanation: Valuable for customer service managers, hospitality leaders, or retail owners, this prompt directs ChatGPT to use quantitative metrics to pinpoint customer experience issues. ChatGPT's recommendations can address root causes and provide clear strategies to improve customer interactions, product experiences, and overall satisfaction and loyalty metrics. Prompt: "Evaluate the operational efficiency of our business based on these metrics: average production time per unit (X hours), defect rate (%Y), and inventory turnover ratio (Z). Identify bottlenecks and inefficiencies and suggest detailed, practical improvements to streamline operations and enhance productivity." Explanation: Suited for COOs, manufacturing managers, or operational directors, this prompt instructs ChatGPT to use key operational metrics to identify inefficiencies and bottlenecks. Recommendations provided will target areas needing improvement, offering precise guidance on enhancing productivity and reducing operational costs. Prompt: "Given our current annual growth rate (X%), market penetration rate (Y%), and product adoption rate (Z%), suggest innovative strategies, product enhancements, or entirely new offerings that can accelerate growth and improve market penetration." Explanation: CEOs, innovation directors, and startup founders can leverage this prompt effectively. ChatGPT utilizes growth and adoption metrics to recommend strategic innovations, new product ideas, or market expansion strategies. Insights provided will help your business proactively address market trends and leverage growth opportunities efficiently. Conclusion on Using ChatGPT to Analyze Your Business Utilizing AI tools like ChatGPT effectively requires carefully crafted, metric-driven prompts. Clearly defined questions empower ChatGPT to deliver relevant, precise, and actionable insights that support your business's strategic goals. 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ChatGPT provides useful insights, but accuracy is highly dependent on clear, complete, and specific prompts. Businesses should validate crucial recommendations using traditional analysis or expert advice, especially for significant strategic decisions. Copyright © by Richard D. Harroch. All rights reserved.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
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Meta rolls out AI-powered translations to creators globally, starting with English and Spanish
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