Khurram Mian on how EY is turning agentic AI into an edge for its clients and people
In his role as EY’s Assurance Leader across MENA, Khurram Mian leads a team of 4,300 professionals across 14 countries and 20 offices. Now in his 22nd year at EY, he reflects on one of the most disruptive trends he’s witnessed in the profession – agentic AI – and how EY is turning the technology into a competitive advantage for its clients and people.
How have you seen the auditing landscape in the MENA region evolve during your career?
Over my 30 years career, the auditing profession in the MENA region has evolved significantly in response to stronger regulation, rapid technological advancement, increasing business complexity, and higher stakeholder expectations.
Following major global corporate failures in the early 2000s, regulatory frameworks, independence requirements, and external oversight have intensified. Audit committees became more engaged and informed, raising the bar for audit quality, transparency, and accountability.
Audits have shifted from checklist‑driven compliance toward a risk‑focused, judgment‑led approach that focuses on trust. Auditors now place greater emphasis on understanding business models, internal controls, and areas involving significant estimates, judgment, and forward‑looking risk.
Technology has been a major catalyst for change. Data analytics, automation, and AI‑enabled tools allow today’s auditors to analyze larger data populations, identify anomalies more effectively and focus on professional judgment on higher‑risk areas, improving audit quality, and bringing greater value to clients through audit relevant insights.
The scope of assurance has also broadened beyond traditional financial statements audit. Stakeholders increasingly seek assurance over non‑financial areas such as ESG and sustainability reporting, cybersecurity, governance, and regulatory compliance enhanced auditor reporting, including key audit matters, has further increased transparency.
Today’s audit teams are more multidisciplinary, combining accounting expertise with skills in data analytics, technology, valuation, and cybersecurity. Overall, the profession has transitioned from being a compliance role to a technology‑enabled, insight‑driven discipline that plays a critical role in building trust in complex markets.
EY has introduced enterprise-scale agentic AI in Assurance. Can you share what this means in practice?
EY’s launch of enterprise‑scale agentic AI in Assurance is a significant transformation known as the ‘Future of Audit. Now’ and reflects how much the audit environment has changed, particularly as clients increasingly adopt AI‑enabled business models and data volumes continue to grow rapidly.
At the same time, regulatory expectations and stakeholder demands are rising. This transformation is designed to help auditors operate effectively in this more complex technological and regulatory landscape.
While the user interface is intuitive and supported by comprehensive training, EY recognizes that AI is also increasing the complexity of clients’ businesses and processes. As a result, auditors need the right combination of methodology, processes, technology, and enablement. Enterprise‑scale agentic AI is a core part of delivering that transformation.
In practice, EY is embedding a multi‑agent AI framework directly into EY’s Global Audit platform called Canvas, integrated with Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Foundry, and Microsoft Fabric. Rather than relying on multiple disconnected tools, auditors can access an assistant within EY Canvas that is designed to support key activities across the audit lifecycle (subject to engagement needs, configuration and appropriate human review). This may reduce the need to switch between applications or re‑enter context, with supporting AI agents operating within the EY Canvas experience in line with established AI principles, governance, and controls.
These AI agents support audit teams across planning, risk assessment, execution, and review by taking care of routine, repetitive and administrative activities. From day one, auditors can automate project management tasks such as assigning work, requesting client information and drafting review notes. They can also quickly summarize audit documentation, including consolidating conclusions on specific matters across the audit file, as well as search and summarize relevant accounting and auditing guidance tailored to each engagement.
Globally, the AI framework will encompass the daily workflows of 130,000 Assurance professionals across 160,000 audit engagements and more than 150 countries and territories. In the MENA region, the embedded framework will impact over 10,000 audit engagements throughout 14 countries.
How does this technology contribute to improving audit quality and the overall client experience?
The technology supports a human‑led, AI‑enabled audit model that is intended to enhance consistency and efficiency for EY professionals and, where relevant, the audit process experience for clients. EY’s approach is not about replacing auditors, but augmenting them with AI to help reduce administrative effort, support risk focus, and streamline selected workflows. By automating routine activities, auditors may spend more time applying professional judgment and engaging with stakeholders, while human oversight, review and accountability remain fundamental throughout the audit.
From a quality perspective, the technology is designed to support stronger and more consistent risk assessments tailored to each engagement. Standardized, guided workflows combined with better use of data can help improve consistency and reduce variability in how teams document and respond to identified risks. AI‑enabled capabilities may also help teams focus earlier on higher‑risk, judgment‑intensive areas, subject to appropriate auditor judgment and review.
This approach can also support a more structured audit experience for clients and EY professionals. For example, information requests may be better targeted and communication clearer, which can help improve transparency around audit progress and timing. The extent of any benefits will depend on the engagement circumstances and ongoing coordination with client teams and audit committees.
How does this initiative support broader government ambitions to advance AI adoption across industries in the region?
The implementation of AI technology into the auditing practice can support government ambitions across the GCC to advance digital transformation and responsible AI adoption, alongside a continued focus on trust, governance, and appropriate regulatory oversight.
Governments across the region are embedding AI into public‑sector operations, policymaking, and regulatory frameworks to digitize their economies, enhance productivity, and improve service delivery and decision‑making. As AI becomes more deeply integrated into government activity, there is an increased focus on governance, accountability, and assurance to ensure outcomes are reliable, ethical, and transparent.
This is particularly relevant in periods of heightened regional and global uncertainty, which can affect operating conditions and increase volatility for organizations across sectors. In this environment, resilience in finance functions is important. Organizations may need to respond to disruption, manage changing risk profiles and adapt to external factors that are outside their direct control. Strong finance and assurance capabilities can help support business continuity, informed decision‑making and longer‑term sustainability.
EY’s AI implementation reflects an approach to deploying AI at scale with a focus on responsible use, governance, and auditability. Capabilities are developed in line with EY’s responsible AI principles and supported by governance, security and data‑privacy measures, in line with EY policies and applicable regulations, with humans firmly in the loop.
By embedding AI within a highly regulated function such as audit and assurance, the initiative is intended to contribute to broader discussions on responsible AI adoption and oversight, without diminishing accountability or public trust.
How do you see agentic AI shaping the future of the auditing profession?
Agentic AI has the potential to fundamentally reshape the auditing profession by changing how audits are performed, where human judgement is applied, and what stakeholders expect from assurance.
At a practical level, agentic AI will increasingly take ownership of routine, repetitive, and administrative activities across the audit lifecycle. Multi‑agent systems can coordinate tasks such as planning workflows, gathering and reconciling information, summarizing documentation, and monitoring progress in real time. This will reduce manual effort, improve the audit project management, and allow auditors to operate at enterprise scale as business models grow more complex and data volumes expand.
More importantly, agentic AI will elevate audit quality by strengthening risk identification and consistency. By analyzing large populations of data and drawing connections across financial, operational and external information, AI agents can surface anomalies, emerging risks and patterns that are difficult to detect through traditional sampling. This enables earlier, sharper risk assessments and more focused, insight‑driven audits tailored to each engagement.
The role of the auditor will continue to shift - not away from judgment, but toward it. As AI handles execution‑heavy activities, auditors can spend more time exercising professional skepticism, evaluating assumptions, challenging management judgments, and explaining outcomes to audit committees and stakeholders. Human oversight, review, and accountability will become even more visible and important.
Agentic AI will also expand assurance beyond financial statements to cover AI governance, controls, data quality, model risk and accountability for AI‑driven outcomes, pushing the profession further into technology assurance, ESG, and non‑financial reporting.
In what ways can this transformation make the auditing profession more attractive to the next generation of talent?
This transformation makes the auditing profession more attractive to the next generation by modernizing both the nature of the work and how young professionals develop their careers.
The integration of advanced technology and AI significantly changes day‑to‑day audit work. By reducing manual, repetitive, and administrative tasks, the profession becomes more analytical and engaging. Early‑career professionals can spend more time on judgment, problem‑solving, and understanding how businesses operate, rather than routine execution. This aligns far more closely with the expectations of younger talent, who are looking for intellectually stimulating roles with visible impact.
Importantly, as part of the ‘Future of Audit. Now’ initiative, EY is matching its technology investment with a strong commitment to people and skills. Alongside these advances, EY will roll out a global upskilling program for audit and technology risk professionals in 2026. The training is designed to be immersive, continuous, and regularly updated to reflect changes in regulation, technology, and audit methodology. This helps professionals build future‑ready skills while maintaining a strong foundation in audit quality, ethics, and professional standards.
This approach also enhances our profession’s attractiveness with the younger generation. Professionals can develop capabilities at the intersection of accounting, technology, data, and risk, making the audit profession more relevant in a digital economy and opening up longer‑term career opportunities.
About Khurram Mian
Khurram has over 30 years of experience in the auditing profession, having worked across Saudi Arabia (KSA), the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and the United Kingdom. He oversees the Assurance business in MENA, spanning the service lines Audit, Financial Accounting Advisory Services (FAAS), Forensics & Integrity Services (FIS), Climate Change and Sustainability Services (CCaSS), and Technology Risk.
In his client work, he specializes in banking, capital markets, and financial services.
