Deltek Study: 91% of Firms Call AI Critical to Success

Deltek research reveals that while project firms anticipate higher profits, execution gaps currently limit the measurable impact of AI. Credit: Nitat Termmee/Getty Images

According to Deltek’s Heather Larkin, leading firms are successfully linking data and AI to drive returns, with 91% of project-based businesses identifying AI as critical to their success.

Operating in an unpredictable economy is the new normal for architecture, engineering, and consulting firms, making financial uncertainty a daily reality.

Despite these challenges, 78% of project-based businesses expect profits to rise in 2026, with over 20% forecasting growth of 10% or more.

To understand how companies navigate this landscape, Deltek’s new research, “The CFO’s Agenda,” draws on its 7th Annual Clarity Study, examining insights from 375 senior strategic decision-makers across the UK, Germany, and Australia.

The study indicates that while 91% of project-based firms view AI as critical to their future success, more than half have yet to see meaningful productivity gains or cost savings.

Bridging this execution gap increasingly falls on finance leaders, who are taking on expanded responsibilities to govern technology, control costs, and connect project data to protect bottom-line margins.

KEY FIGURES

• Over half of the surveyed firms are still not seeing moderate productivity gains or cost savings from AI
• More than one in five forecast profit growth of 10% or more in 2026
• Cost control has surged as a priority, rising eight percentage points from 26% of firms in 2024 to 34% today
• Only one in five operate with a fully integrated, end-to-end project management system

From experimentation to financial impact

AI has become an operational mandate, with 91% of project-based firms stating AI is critical to their success. However, over half of these organisations are still not seeing moderate productivity or cost savings.

Finance leaders are increasingly prioritising the integration of AI into finance workflows to secure measurable return.

Research highlights that the strongest near-term opportunities for AI lie in project planning, resourcing and performance reporting. Organisations are also finding substantial value by applying AI tools to billing and back-office finance operations.

The role of the CFO has fundamentally changed. Today’s finance leaders aren’t simply reporting on performance, they’re shaping it.

Heather Larkin, Chief Financial Officer at Deltek

Deploying AI across these functions improves visibility, reduces manual work and protects margins.

The research also points to agentic AI as the next major shift, with firms that invest now in integrated data and governance best placed to capture the benefits.

Heather Larkin, Chief Financial Officer at Deltek, says: “The highest-performing firms in our study share common characteristics. They’re all connecting financial data to project data, embedding AI to deliver measurable returns, treating cyber risk as a financial exposure and building KPI discipline that enables early intervention rather than late reporting.”

Heather Larkin, Chief Financial Officer at Deltek. Credit: Heather Larkin/LinkedIn

What’s hindering real-time financial decisions?

A structural gap exists between firms that track performance and those that can act on signals quickly enough to protect margins.

While 86% of businesses say they track operating profit adequately or very well, up from 75% in 2024, just 22% have a fully integrated, end-to-end project management system.

Because few organisations maintain connected systems, finance leaders are making commercial decisions using KPI data that is manually compiled or incomplete.

Stronger-performing firms that reported higher profit growth in 2025 were more effective at tracking specific metrics such as project profitability and revenue factor.

These successful organisations also maintained consistent oversight of net labour margin, backlog and overhead rate to drive commercial performance.

Without end-to-end integration, organisations miss early performance signals and can only act after profits are already lost.

As project-based businesses enter 2026, the finance leader's ability to unite data, technology, and cost discipline will be the ultimate differentiator between forecasting profit and actually realising it.

Survey Demographics

• Report: The CFO’s Agenda
• Sample: 375 senior leaders (CEOs, C-suite, department heads)
• Firm Size: Minimum 20 employees
• Coverage: UK, Germany and Australia
• Published by: Deltek, headquartered in Herndon, Virginia, is an enterprise software provider that specialises in software for project-based businesses. Trusted by over 30,000 organisations, its intelligent platform covers enterprise resource planning (ERP), project accounting, bidding, resource planning and analytics. It delivers operational clarity and financial control to industries like government contracting, architecture, engineering and consulting.