When Deirdre Hogan began her career in tax, deadlines were physical things. Documents were printed, envelopes stuffed, and if time was tight, someone might even drive submissions directly to the tax authorities.

“Now everything is automated, online, instant,” says Hogan, an Indirect Tax Partner with EY Ireland. “Even dealing with the tax authorities has changed – you don’t pick up the phone anymore. You interact with systems.”

But that shift – from paper to platforms – is only part of the story. Over the past decade, and especially in the last five years, the tax function has been transformed by forces that go far beyond digitisation. Regulation has intensified, expectations around transparency have grown, and tax authorities themselves have become increasingly sophisticated, using advanced data, analytics, and technology in their work.

Perhaps most significantly, artificial intelligence is now moving to the centre of how tax work is organised and delivered.

Those trends are reflected clearly in EY’s Tax & Finance Operations Survey of more than 1,600 tax and finance executives globally. According to the research, 86 per cent of tax and finance leaders rank data, AI and technology as their top strategic priority – a dramatic shift from even a few years ago, when cost control and compliance dominated the agenda.

Yet the same survey points to a clear gap between ambition and execution. While leaders largely agree on where they want to go, most tax functions are still in the early stages of transformation.

“There’s a real gap between where organisations want to be and where they actually are,” Hogan says. “Most tax functions weren’t designed for this level of change.”

A function under pressure

Hogan, a chartered tax advisor with more than 17 years’ experience in Irish and international indirect tax, leads EY Ireland’s indirect tax practice (excluding financial services). She spent almost seven years in the US working with multinational companies, helping them set up and manage indirect tax functions across people, process and technology.

Over that period, she has witnessed firsthand how expectations of the tax function have fundamentally shifted.

“Historically, tax was very much seen as a compliance function,” Hogan says. “Now it’s expected to be a strategic business partner.”

That expectation is borne out in the research. Almost 80 per cent of respondents say tax and finance functions are now expected to deliver insight into broader business strategy – everything from supply chain operations and investment decisions to risk management and scenario planning.

At the same time, the volume of regulatory change continues to grow.

“There’s a huge amount being asked of tax teams,” Hogan says. “And the regulatory environment just keeps getting more complex.”

The EY research shows that 81 per cent of organisations expect to make moderate to significant changes to how they operate over the next two years, including changes to supply chains driven by geopolitical uncertainty. For tax functions, that translates directly into increased complexity, more data points and greater pressure to provide timely, accurate analysis.

Layered on top of that is Pillar Two, the OECD initiative that implements a global minimum tax rate of 15 per cent, which the survey identifies as the most significant legislative change affecting large organisations globally.

“Pillar Two is a massive undertaking for companies that fall within scope,” Hogan says. “It’s not just a tax exercise – it’s a data exercise across the entire organisation.”

Despite its scale, not every company is prepared. While 85 per cent of respondents expect Pillar Two to increase their overall tax liability, only a small minority feel very well prepared to comply.

“That tells you something,” Hogan says. “The impact is understood. The readiness is not always there.”

AI moves from optional to essential

For Hogan, AI increasingly sits at the centre of her work and her outlook.

“There’s a huge focus on AI at the moment,” she says. “But there’s also a lot of uncertainty.”

While leaders expect AI to improve effectiveness by up to 30 per cent according to the research and free up significant budget for higher-value work, most tax functions remain at an early stage of adoption. Many are still experimenting, unsure where AI can be deployed safely and at scale.

“People are overthinking it,” Hogan says. “They feel like they need to solve everything at once.”

At EY, Hogan works with clients in a deliberately practical way, breaking processes down into their component parts.

“We bring clients in to what we call our ‘Tax Lab’ to decompose the process,” she says. “We look at what people are doing day to day.”

In one example, a multinational grappling with complex invoicing requirements between Europe and Latin America had two employees spending four days each month reconciling invoices, VAT returns and bank statements.

“It was very manual, very spreadsheet-driven,” Hogan says.

By standardising the data and introducing automation, the workload dropped dramatically.

“We got it down to less than a day – time that these employees can utilise for more higher-value tasks requiring critical thinking,” she says.

When tax authorities go digital

For Hogan, however, it is indirect tax – particularly VAT – that best illustrates how profoundly the landscape is changing.

“I’m an indirect tax partner, and e-invoicing and real-time reporting is huge,” she says. “Indirect tax is one of the largest consumers of data in any organisation.”

In other jurisdictions, real-time reporting and mandatory e-invoicing regimes have already transformed how VAT is administered. Europe is now moving rapidly in the same direction through VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA), formally adopted by the EU Council in March 2025. Mandatory e-invoicing is set to apply from 2028for Irish businesses.

The survey suggests many organisations are underestimating the operational impact of that shift. While awareness of ViDA is growing, fewer companies have begun the detailed systems and data work required to comply.

“People hear 2028 and think it’s far away,” Hogan says. “But when you start talking about the ERP systems, data remediation and process redesign required to get ready for ViDA, it’s actually very close.

“In many jurisdictions now, tax authorities want to see that invoice in real time. They want to see the data before the customer even receives the invoice.”

That immediacy fundamentally alters the compliance relationship.

“If your data isn’t right, you’ll know about it very quickly,” Hogan says. “You don’t have the luxury of fixing things months later.”

Data as the fault line

If there is one theme that runs through both the survey findings and Hogan’s conversations with clients, it is data.

“Most organisations have the data somewhere,” she says. “The challenge is that it’s often in silos.”

The EY survey puts hard numbers on that challenge. Ninety-one per cent of tax and finance leaders say their data is stored across too many systems, often on local drives. Forty-five per cent say their biggest barrier to transformation is the inability to execute a sustainable data, AI and technology strategy.

“When you’re dealing with real-time reporting or e-invoicing, manual workarounds just don’t scale,” Hogan says. “The tax function can’t operate the way it used to.

“People tend to think of VAT as a tax issue. But ViDA is really a finance systems issue, a data issue and an operating model issue.

“You have to think about where the data is coming from, how it’s validated, and who owns it. If you get that wrong, it creates problems very quickly.”

Indigenous versus multinational realities

The survey also highlights differences in how indigenous businesses and multinationals experience these pressures — a distinction Hogan sees clearly in practice.

“Multinationals often have scale and resources, but they also have complexity,” she says. “Multiple systems, multiple jurisdictions, multiple interpretations of the same rules.”

Indigenous businesses, by contrast, may have simpler structures but far less slack.

“They might have one or two people covering everything,” Hogan says. “So when something like ViDA comes along, it can feel overwhelming.”

In both cases, the temptation is to postpone.

“The danger is thinking this is something you’ll deal with later,” she says. “Later comes very quickly.”

Freeing people up – and changing the work

This points to another trend that Hogan is seeing in the market  that the goal of automation is not simply efficiency. Tax leaders want to fundamentally rebalance how their teams spend their time — cutting routine work and reinvesting capacity in insight, analysis and strategic support.

“It frees people up to do more interesting work,” Hogan says.

That shift is also driving changes in operating models. The research shows growing interest in co-sourcing and managed services, particularly for highly standardised compliance activities.

“Not every organisation needs to do everything themselves,” Hogan says. “What matters is having the right oversight and the right data.”

At the same time, the profile of the tax professional is evolving.

“You still need deep technical expertise,” she says. “That’s not going away.”

But increasingly, teams are blending tax specialists with data analysts, technologists and hybrid roles.

“You need people who understand data, who are comfortable with technology, and who can think more broadly about the business,” Hogan says.

No time to wait

Despite the scale of change underway, Hogan remains optimistic about the future of tax as a profession.

“Tax isn’t going away,” she says. “If anything, it’s becoming more important.”

And if there is one message she returns to repeatedly, it is urgency.

“People think they have time,” she says. “But these changes are happening now.”

Whether it is Pillar Two, VAT in the Digital Age or AI-enabled compliance, the direction of travel is clear.

“The tax function can’t stand still,” Hogan concludes. “The future won’t wait.”

This is partner content and has been produced in association with EY.