GenAI in Tax: Debunking the Myth that Personas are Agents

Understanding future-shaping concepts is crucial as technology continues to blur the line between human and digital. As GenAI continues to evolve, the terms “personas�� and “agents�� are increasingly being thrown around, leading to confusion. While both play crucial roles in how we interact with technology, their distinctions are vital for leveraging their full potential. To navigate this evolving landscape, it is important to grasp the nuances that set these AI terms apart.

GenAI personas are designed to perform specific tasks within a standalone GenAI experience, serving as virtual assistants that rely on human guidance to complete tasks. For example, if a tax professional needs a complex tax return translated from one language to another, they can interact with a persona to facilitate the process quickly and accurately. Other tasks might include parsing through dense tax legislation, providing detailed explanations of tax codes, or drafting preliminary, yet personalized responses to client inquiries, all necessitating some element of human planning and orchestration.

��㣨Leyu�� Tax personas are intentionally designed to be accessible by tax departments, requiring little to no coding skills. This design enables any tax professional to quickly begin creating, customizing, and deploying these virtual assistants—fostering broader adoption and delivering immediate, tangible results on day one.

GenAI Agents: Adding Automation into Tax Workflows

GenAI agents, on the other hand, are autonomous systems that independently perform tasks and only call upon a human when needed. Unlike personas, agents initiate actions and complete tasks without direct human guidance, integrating seamlessly with ��㣨Leyu�� Digital Gateway. For instance, when a foreign tax document is uploaded to Digital Gateway, an agent is instructed to automatically identify, translate, summarize key points, and route it to the appropriate tax specialist for final review within the Digital Gateway Workflow module. This distinction highlights the agent's ability to autonomously execute tasks while involving humans only when necessary to achieve the desired outcome.

The Power of Integration in Tax Services

At ��㣨Leyu�� LLP (��㣨Leyu��), we recognize the value of both personas and agents in our tax practice. Personas provide the flexibility and specificity needed for individual tasks, while agents offer the automation and efficiency required for parts of complex workflows. Together, they provide day-to-day operational benefits and pave the way for more transformative initiatives. This approach also addresses the current reality that many tax departments do not have agents readily available but can prudently get started with personas. By integrating both into our operations and ��㣨Leyu�� Digital Gateway platform, we are ensuring our tax services are accurate, consistent, and providing additional value to our clients.

Automated Reporting:

Agents are automatically generating and distributing tax reports when new data is available, reducing the time and effort required for manual reporting and ensuring timely review. The shift from “preparer�� to “reviewer�� unlocks the power of the tax specialist to apply their knowledge and skills leading to increased value-added insights and services.

Regulatory Compliance

Agents are monitoring changes in tax regulations and automatically updating relevant documents and reports, helping our clients stay compliant with the latest laws and guidelines through a personalized news feed.

Data Analysis:

Personas assist tax professionals to perform detailed data analysis, identifying trends and potential issues in tax returns, which can then be reviewed by our tax experts for further action.

Document Translation:

Tax professionals instruct personas to quickly translate tax documents, ensuring our global teams can collaborate across a wide array of different languages and jurisdictions.

A thorough understanding of GenAI technology—particularly the distinctions between personas and agents—is increasingly important for any tax department during their GenAI journey. By parsing through the noise and identifying what is genuinely available today, tax leaders can prioritize the right tools to streamline processes and enhance decision-making. At ��㣨Leyu��, our commitment to leveraging the latest GenAI solutions is rooted in delivering tangible benefits now, while also building a strong foundation for the GenAI-enabled tax services of tomorrow. By harnessing both personas and agents, we look forward to continuing our exploration of GenAI’s capabilities—ultimately offering our clients unprecedented innovation in tax.

Stay tuned for more insights on how ��㣨Leyu�� is harnessing the power of GenAI to drive innovation and excellence in our tax services.

��㣨Leyu�� Digital Gateway

��㣨Leyu�� Digital Gateway is a centralized, cloud-based access portal to a suite of tax tools that facilitate and accelerate a wide range of tax operations, including robust support for tax modeling and scenario planning. With leading-edge capabilities for managing, analyzing and extracting insights from data, Digital Gateway helps tax leaders identify and mitigate risks, respond swiftly to regulatory changes, plan for future scenarios, and turn the challenges of the tax policy trifecta into opportunities for strategic growth and resilience.

Digital Gateway leverages GenAI's accuracy and speed to integrate into your tax function workflows, from automation of basic tasks to data review and analysis to strategic modeling and planning.