icon

DA/DS 2025 Sessions and Presenters

Welcome to the DA/DS conference lineup, where we delve into the transformative power of data analytics and data science in the realm of financial management. This year’s sessions are designed to equip you with cutting-edge insights and practical strategies to navigate the complexities of modern financial environments. From leveraging robotic process automation (RPA) to streamline financial processes, to adopting a data strategist mindset for enhanced audit readiness, our expert-led discussions will provide you with the tools and knowledge to drive efficiency, accountability, and innovation in your organization. Join us as we explore the latest advancements in AI-driven document extraction, intelligent automation, and risk analytics, and discover how these technologies are reshaping the future of financial management. Let’s embark on this journey together and unlock the full potential of data and technology in transforming financial operations.

Using RPA to Automate Financial Use Cases

Deloitte Process Robotic

Doug Poggi, Senior Manager, Deloitte
Robert (Bob) Simmons, Specialist Leader, Deloitte

The Deloitte Process Robotics (DPR) team brings RPA to the full spectrum of financial use cases. As often is the case, massive flows of financial data, in financial processes are inundating our financial workforce. RPA brings automation to these use cases, to free up financial analyst to focus on the higher value functions and investigating the data, while leaving the data processing to bots. We’ll dive into the DPR solution, what RPA can be used for, and how to quickly get going automating, with examples and demos.

The FM Data Strategist: Driving Audit Readiness and Decision Support Without Becoming a Data Analyst

Management Concepts, Inc

Mr. David Doane, Senior Instructor, Management Concepts
Ms. Cassandra Madden, Director, Dept of Navy Financial Management Data & Digital Transformation
Mr. Cody Ferguson, Principal Architect for Data and AI, Accenture Federal Services

In an era where audit excellence and accountability depend on data fluency, DoD financial managers must evolve—not into data analysts, but into data strategists. This panel explores how FM professionals can adopt a data strategist mindset to enhance audit readiness, support internal controls, and influence strategic decisions, without needing deep technical expertise.  Through this small, moderated discussion and practical insights, panelists will be allowed to unpack more than larger size panels to what it means to be a data strategist in the federal financial environment. They’ll highlight how targeted upskilling in data literacy, cost analysis, and decision supporting tools like Excel and automation-enabling systems—can empower FM teams to lead more effectively. Learn how real-world applications of data thinking, not coding, are delivering measurable value in areas like audit trail documentation, risk assessment, and transparency.

Attendees will walk away with:

  • A practical framework for evolving FM roles in data-rich audit environments
  • Examples of success using existing tools and targeted training
  • Ideas for enabling a data-savvy FM workforce without overburdening with analytics training
  • Guidance on how to shape conversations with leadership, auditors, and stakeholders using a strategist lens

Transforming financial process through intelligent automation using LLMs and Computer vision technologies

KPMG LLP

Negacy D. Hailu, PhD, Manager Data Scientist

Government agencies often rely on standardized forms to document transactions, inventory, and logistical activities. In the digital transformation era, the automation of such standardized form processing in the governmental workflows is essential for increasing efficiency, minimizing human errors and enhancing security. Our work introduces an innovative AI-driven document extraction tool specifically designed to extract critical attributes from the U.S. government form DD 1348.  System Overview: The AI-driven document extraction tool we developed is built with modularity and scalability in mind in Foundry, offering robust attribute extraction from DD 1348 forms.

The core system consists of two interdependent components:

  • Named Entity Extraction Pipeline: this module utilizes the GPT-4o large language model to identify and extract key attributes. The language model leverages its visual capability to extract entities based on not just textual features but also visual features.
  • Signature Detection and Verification: employing deep learning computer vision techniques, this module detects signatures and verifies their authenticity using a combination of ResNet architectures for object detection and Siamese networks for signature verification. Our proposed AI-powered solution will cut down the current manual effort significantly, which is estimated to take 5 to 10 minutes per document per reviewer, with comparable performance.

Agentic Automation and the Pursuit of a Clean Audit: Redefining Risk in Defense Financial Management

UiPath

Rahul Gupta, Chief of Staff, Public Sector, UiPath
Nicole Otero, Automation Portfolio Owner, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Financial Management and Comptroller (FM&C)
David Ehrlich, Managing Director, Groundswell
Niki Lizarraga, Special Advisor and Senior Program Manager, Significance, Inc.

Persistent audit deficiencies within the Department of Defense, highlighted by the GAO and DoD IG, reflect deep-rooted challenges in financial data integrity, reconciliation, and internal controls. This panel examines the application of agentic automation; autonomous, AI-enabled systems that detect and remediate audit risks to address these systemic material weaknesses. Informed by recent automation implementations that collectively address approximately 75% of identified audit findings and over $600B in balance sheet exposure, we analyze operational use cases, barriers to institutional adoption, and implications for internal control modernization. The discussion will address the concept of the agentic auditor as a scalable, AI and data-driven approach to improving accountability in complex DoD environments.

Harnessing Risk Analytics for Audit and Decision Support

Diligent

Across the Department of Defense, leaders are tasked with making high-stakes decisions in environments defined by uncertainty, complexity, and risk. Yet, much like in the private sector, many risk management and audit programs fall short of delivering real value, often becoming compliance-driven exercises that produce reports but fail to inform mission or operational decisions. The differentiator is risk analytics. By applying analytics to risk and audit data, organizations can move beyond static assessments and create dynamic, real-time insights that directly support decision-making.  This session, Harnessing Risk Analytics for Audit and Decision Support in Defense, will explore how DoD and other agencies can leverage analytics to strengthen internal audit functions, improve oversight, and drive operational resilience. Through real-world examples and case studies, participants will see how risk analytics helps identify and monitor emerging risks earlier, prioritize mission-critical issues, and transform audit results into actionable intelligence for decision-makers. The session will introduce an “analytics maturity curve” that allows leaders to assess their current capabilities and identify concrete steps for advancing. Attendees will leave with practical approaches to integrating analytics into audit and decision support functions—enhancing accountability, efficiency, and mission readiness.

Turning Audit Pain into Audit Power: Data-Driven Approaches for Lasting Readiness

Iberia Advisory

Erica Mehm, President, Iberia Advisory
Andrea Fisher, DoD Account Executive, Celonis
Daniel Bethke, Automation Portfolio Director, ASN (FM&C)
CWO Michael Vitale, Director, Marine Corps Financial Management Operations Support, USMC

Federal agencies face constant audit demands. Limited time and stretched resources make manual, brute-force methods unsustainable. These methods overburden staff, often leading to repeated audit cycles, and growing fatigue.  At the same time, agencies must balance simplicity with the level of detail required in financial processes, and reporting. Without clear, well-documented records, supporting business decisions during an audit becomes nearly impossible.   The good news? Technology can help. Process intelligence tools reduce audit headaches, lighten the workload, and provide leaders with better information. 

Agencies can both empower their people and alleviate pain points in the audit process by leveraging these tools to:

  • Automatically map end-to-end financial workflows
  • Monitor internal control in real time
  • Keep financial records organized and audit ready
  • Identify risks, errors, and fraud patterns early
  • Move from periodic check-ins to continuous monitoring

In this session, speakers from Iberia, Celonis, and government partners will explore adaptable strategies that work across financial systems. Participants will walk away with practical know-how on using process intelligence tools to boost accountability, transparency, and decision-making, to achieve better audit results.

Envisioning the Future: Agentic AI and it’s Impact for Defense Financial Management

Amazon / AWS

Mr. Brett Eisen, Principal Solutions Architect, Amazon Web Services

Generative AI, and in turn Agentic AI, stand poised to revolutionize defense financial management by addressing longstanding challenges in auditability, data fragmentation, and risk detection facing the Department of Defense.   In this session, AWS will introduce Agentic AI to provide a baseline understanding of what they are (and what they are not), and demonstrate how Agentic AI, accessed through Amazon’s Bedrock’s large language models (LLMs), leverages a multi-agent architecture to plan, research, and synthesize information. Attendees will gain insight into real-world applications through a visual demo and use case that illustrate the potential for Agentic AI to proactively plan, make decisions, and improve outputs over time, making this suitable for tackling complex, dynamic challenges in various domains including financial management, enterprise risk management, and audit.  In summary, the session by AWS highlights Agentic AI as a cutting-edge, multi-agent system using large language models that promises to transform defense financial management by enhancing auditability, mitigating risks, and improving efficiency—all underpinned by secure, governed AI architectures tailored for mission-critical environments. This provides senior defense leaders a foundational understanding and practical use cases to evaluate AI adoption in their agencies

C-CCARS Financial Optimization Platform – A Strategic Enabler to Aligning Audit and Warfighter Success

ClearInfo

Chris Robins, President, ClearInfo LLC
Ray Chance, CTO, ClearInfo LLC
Eric Knabke, ERP Practice Lead, ClearInfo LLC
Rich Luzzi, ERP Implementation Lead

Our solution,  C-CCARS AI Capture Services, modernizes how the DoD can capture and prepare information to achieve a clean audit opinion.  It provides a modern AI-orchestrated financial and asset management process integration approach to ingest, classify, extract, PII and validate audit-critical documents at scale.  Our solution provides pre-built integrations to leading services like Google Doc AI & Gemini, AWS Textract & Bedrock, Azure Document Intelligence & ChatGPT. Impact: Data Accuracy, Completeness, Effciency and Auditability. 

C-CCARS: Vendor Invoice Management Services:  C-CCARS Vendor Invoice Management (VIM) leveraging AI and ML our VIM solution streamlines and automates document processing across the procure-to-pay and order-to-cash cycle. It automates tasks such as matching items, managing approvals, and intelligently minimizing data entry and user actions – using business context, historic data and flexible AI algorithms. Impact: Invoicing Accuracy, Completeness, Effciency and Auditability 

C-CCARS: ERP/BPM-Document Management Integration Services: C-CCARS ERP/BPM-Document Management Integration Services leveraging AI and RPA maximizes the value of adding context to financial processes (procure-to-pay, funds balance with Treasury, order-to-cash, etc.) and asset management processes (general equipment, operating materials and supplies, etc.) by incorporating real-time document management within the business processes. Impact: Data Accuracy, Completeness, Efficiency, and Auditability

From Idea to Impact: How Federal Leaders Prioritize Automation Use Cases

Kearney & Company

Daniel Grant, Principal, Kearney & Company

Federal agencies are inundated with opportunities for automation—but which ones deserve immediate attention? This panel brings together practitioners and federal financial leaders to share how they evaluate, rank, and greenlight automation use cases in environments where resources and staff bandwidth are limited. 

Join our panel of experts as they discuss: 

  • Real-world stories of automation prioritization, highlighting what worked and what didn’t
  • Methods for identifying use cases aligned to audit reduction, risk mitigation, and process optimization
  • Lessons learned from cross-functional governance boards, Centers of Excellence, and pilot programs
  • Key criteria for balancing complexity, ROI, and mission urgency

The Strategic Imperative of Data-Driven Financial Management in the Public Sector

Kearney & Company

This presentation outlines how a data-driven approach, powered by advanced analytics, artificial intelligence (AI), and robotic process automation (RPA), can be applied to the task order lifecycle of these new IT contracts. The report details a methodology for integrating these technologies from the initial requirements definition through ongoing performance monitoring. Attendees will learn how a proactive, data-centric framework can transform contract management from a complex administrative burden into a strategic advantage, ensuring fiscal integrity and empowering data-driven decision-making.

Using Data to Align Financial and Human Capital Decisions

Andrew Morgan Consulting, LLC

Megan Maxwell, Workforce Planning & Optimization Lead, Andrew Morgan

Government agencies this year have faced unprecedented strain as budget cuts and DOGE pressures demand greater performance with fewer resources. The core challenge lies not only in reduced funding but in outdated workforce planning approaches built on fragmented data, decentralized reporting, and legacy processes. These weaknesses hinder the ability to align manpower with financial realities, driving inefficiency, risk, and lost agility. People Planner—also known as “Faces to Spaces”—offers a solution by unifying financial and workforce data in a single, authoritative system. Automated reconciliation enhances transparency by eliminating mismatches, dashboards improve efficiency by surfacing vacancies and turnover, and scenario modeling enables leaders to test workforce options with immediate visibility into financial and mission impacts. Accurate, reconciled data also strengthens budget submissions and equips agencies to defend funding positions during DOGE reviews. By consolidating into fewer, authoritative systems with higher data quality, agencies can right size their workforce, align limited dollars with mission needs, and build trust through consistent, auditable reporting. Looking ahead, People Planner lays the foundation for AI and automation to further forecast costs, predict attrition, and identify risks—ensuring government leaders can deliver transparency, accountability, and resilience in an era of fiscal constraint.

From Data to Decision: Modernizing Investment Under-Execution Reviews with Advanced Analytics and AI

Integrated Data Services, Inc.

John Cole, Chief Product Officer (CPO), Integrated Data Services
Jeff Haberman, Vice President of Growth, Integrated Data Services

Each year, the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Military Services dedicate significant human resources to ensure that enacted investment appropriations are executed effectively. The stakes are high: unspent funds risk expiring, while persistent under-execution can lead to reductions in future budget requests and increased scrutiny from Congress. To mitigate these risks, the investment under-execution review (aka INV-001) has become a cornerstone of defense financial management. This process relies not only on timely and auditable financial statements, but also on the ability to accurately forecast unexecuted funds well before the end of the fiscal year.  This presentation will demonstrate how the Military Services are modernizing INV-001 reviews by applying emerging technologies and data-driven approaches. Attendees will gain insights into how improved data governance, advanced analytics, predictive modeling, and machine learning are being leveraged to forecast under-execution with greater precision. These methods provide earlier visibility into which budget lines are most at risk, enabling leaders to take proactive steps that reduce risk, preserve appropriations, and ensure mission priorities are funded.  By highlighting real-world applications and lessons learned, this session will show how modern analytics are transforming a labor-intensive compliance process into a more efficient, predictive, and decision-focused capability for the DoD.

Transforming Finance at Scale: Lessons Learned from industry to Government

Blackline

Michael Polaha, Senior Vice President, Global Managing Director Financial Close Solutions
Leslie Casson Stevens, Industry Executive Advisor
Jerry Short, President / Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Financial Management Systems
Brandee Bible, Senior Vice President, Public Sector

Department of Defense agencies, including the Army, Navy, and Air Force, are preparing for sweeping financial modernization initiatives. As these efforts move forward, the Department of Defense faces challenges familiar to global enterprises that have already undergone similar transformations. Learning from those experiences is critical to ensuring mission success.  This panel features the former CFO of Johnson & Johnson, who helped lead one of the largest and most complex finance transformations in the private sector; a senior former DoD financial executive with deep expertise in federal financial management; and an SAP finance transformation leader with hands-on experience guiding organizations through large-scale change.  Panelists will share how industry leaders approached modernization—addressing stakeholder readiness, overcoming implementation challenges, and achieving measurable outcomes. While the transition from ECC to S/4HANA is one example of this journey, the discussion will take a broader view of how to prepare for change at scale and what strategies can be adapted to the federal context.  Attendees will leave with practical insights into lessons learned, proven playbooks, and actionable steps to prepare their organizations for success as government financial transformation accelerates.

Harnessing the power of AI, machine learning (ML), and robotic process automation (RPA) to modernize audit processes and decision support.

Chris Hodges

AI and automation are transforming how finance and accounting teams operate across government and defense. In this engaging session, Christopher Hodges—Annapolis graduate, former Naval officer, and author of Noble Automation Now—shows you how to turn disruption into opportunity. His proven framework helps leaders innovate, motivate, and most importantly, help humans be heroes in the age of AI. Discover what to automate, what to avoid, and how to make your teams stronger, more focused, and future-ready.

Chris is our closing Keynote speaker and will be available after the presentation for a book signing.