AI doesn’t replace financial rigor or human judgment, Friar wrote—it helps teams find issues sooner, ask better questions, and get insights to the business while there’s still time to act. “As we help other companies transform how they work with AI, it matters that we lead by example,” she wrote.
As of Monday, the post was racking up likes and comments aplenty, many echoing the same idea: AI speeds up the information reaching decision-makers, but judgment and accountability stay human. Variations of “human accountability remains” or “people still need to use their judgment” showed up in at least seven comments. One commenter put it directly: “The distinction between automating analysis and outsourcing judgment is an important one.” Others framed it as an industry shift—AI turning finance from a “reactive… painful scramble” during close into “a core strategic partner for the board.”
Friar kept the momentum going on Monday with an essay on OpenAI’s site on what she’s learned building an AI-native finance function.
“When I joined OpenAI two years ago, there was only a small finance team supporting a company growing at extraordinary speed,” she wrote. “We needed to build the function from the ground up and make AI fundamental to how we work, make decisions, and support the business.” The team set two goals: a zero-day close and continuously updated forecasting.
