Professionals in the legal, tax, audit, trade and accounting, risk and fraud, and compliance fields are becoming more familiar with AI tools. Now they’re determining how to more effectively incorporate them into their practice.
The Thomson Reuters Institute has published its third annual Future of Professionals Report, examining how these practitioners view the evolution of their work. When comparing the 2024 and 2025 reports, significant changes in AI adoption trends were revealed:
- There is a shift from general optimism and experimentation with AI to a more strategic and measurable approach to AI adoption.
- A clear separation is emerging between businesses that have rigorous AI strategies in place and those that do not.
- Organizations that fail to establish a concrete AI adoption plan risk falling behind their peers and competitors.
Keep reading to explore more changes you should be aware of.
Perceptions of AI’s impact
Taken together, the two reports show that professionals steadily continue to develop a positive view of AI and how it can boost productivity and save time. Of the professionals surveyed in the 2024 report, 77% expressed the belief that AI would have a high or transformational impact on their professions within five years. That’s up from 67% in the Future of Professionals Report 2023. In addition, 42% said AI would have a transformational impact, with 78% seeing AI as a force for good in their profession.
In the 2025 report, 80% predict AI will have a high or transformational impact within five years. The percentage citing AI’s impact as “transformational” was twice that of any other category. There’s a stronger consensus that AI is the dominant force shaping the future. But professionals have become more worried about issues not directly related to AI, notably the technology skills gap and the rapid pace of regulatory change. Fears that AI could cause job loss in professional fields are ebbing.
All told, professionals’ positive perceptions of AI have solidified and slightly increased. The focus has shifted from generalized optimism to a more nuanced understanding of AI’s strategic value and the risks of not adopting it.
The percentage citing AI’s impact as “transformational” was twice that of any other category.
Pace and nature of AI adoption
On average, the professionals surveyed in the 2024 report predicted that 56% of their work would utilize AI-powered technologies within five years. At the same time, 31% felt their organization was moving too slowly towards AI adoption.
That last number didn’t change much in the 2025 report, where 30% still believe their organization is moving too slowly to incorporate AI into their operations. That said, 53% say their organization is already seeing at least one benefit from AI adoption. In addition, 46% note their organization invested in new AI-powered tech in the past year, and 30% of respondents say they regularly use AI tools in their practices. At the same time, only 38% expect transformational or high levels of change in their own organization in 2025.
One key conclusion one can draw from this data is that AI adoption is accelerating, but there’s a growing gap between organizations with a clear AI strategy and those without one. While individual use of AI tools is up, there’s evidence that many organizations aren’t following a strategy for AI adoption.
Return on investment and productivity gains
The professionals surveyed in the 2024 report said that they expected using AI tools would free up four hours per week in the next year —about 200 hours per year — eight hours in three years, and 12 hours in five years. In the 2025 report, professionals were even more upbeat about AI’s potential near-term productivity gains, with respondents projecting time savings of five hours a week within just the next year, or 240 hours per year. That translates to an average annual value gain of about $19,000 per user. For the U.S. legal and the tax and accounting sectors, this represents an estimated $32 billion combined annual impact.
The data across the two reports reveals that the ROI of AI tools is no longer theoretical — it’s demonstrably real. The 2025 report’s research shows that organizations that have put AI adoption strategies into practice are twice as likely to experience revenue growth as those without such strategies.
The data across the two reports reveals that the ROI of AI tools is no longer theoretical — it’s demonstrably real.
Barriers and concerns remain
While professionals have become more optimistic and even enthusiastic about adopting and incorporating AI in their work, the Future of Professionals reports also show that many still have significant concerns. In 2024, the top worries professionals expressed were accuracy of outputs, data security, and overreliance on technology. In addition, almost two-thirds saw data security as vital for responsible use.
A year later, those surveyed said accuracy of the results that AI tools deliver is the top barrier preventing their organizations from increasing their investment in AI. Indeed, 91% of respondents believe that AI should be held to higher accuracy standards than humans. Concerns about data privacy, confidentiality, and transparency also increased over 2024.
Preparing for the road ahead
The data from the 2024 and 2025 reports suggest that professionals’ expectations about AI tools’ accuracy have become more stringent. While concerns about job loss and malicious use have lessened, professionals have become more worried about overreliance on AI and a related atrophy in professional expertise. For sure, there are questions to be asked before adopting AI.
The data speaks for itself — it’s clear that the future of professional practice will be closely intertwined with the use of AI tools. The organizations these professionals work for must ensure that AI initiatives and their execution are aligned with specific strategic objectives when it comes to adoption.
Therefore, the strategic deployment of professional-grade AI tools is indispensable for future success.
