In a commentary, SMU Professors of Accounting (Education) Seow Poh Sun and Gary Pan, SMU Associate Professor of Accounting (Practice) Clarence Goh, SMU Assistant Professor of Accounting (Education) Benjamin Lee, and Shawgat Kutubi, senior lecturer at CQ University Australia cited research by SAP and Oxford Economics published in November 2025, which found that organisations in Singapore spend an average of S$18.9 million annually on artificial intelligence (AI) and related digital initiatives. Despite this, seven in 10 business leaders surveyed remain unconvinced that the investment is delivering its full potential. The authors said that their new research found that system complexity and communication volume negatively affected productivity, while data volume did not measurably affect productivity. They identified information, system features and communication overload as key challenges, with accountants often managing them through “containment” and “adaptation” rather than broader organisational changes. Productivity, they said, recovers as firms move towards “refinement” and “enhancement” – aligning tools with actual tasks, streamlining features, adjusting communication patterns and enabling higher-value work. The authors noted that few organisations have examined technology’s impact on their workforce or whether the resulting work environment is serving the people it was designed to support.