Sage Intacct is a cloud-based ERP and financial management platform used by mid-market companies to manage accounting, AP/AR, financial reporting, and compliance.
Project Summary
Sage Intacct needed an intelligent, end-to-end AP experience to replace fragmented workflows and unpredictable automation. I led the 0→1 design of a unified AP workspace and the multi-agent patterns that shaped Sage’s AI-first strategy.
By introducing guided workflows, anomaly detection, and cross-process insights, we transformed AP/PO into a coordinated, intelligent system. These patterns became the foundation for Sage’s AI Agents—AP, Close, Assurance, Time, and the Finance Intelligence Agent—delivering 50–90% reductions in manual entry and 2–3× improvements in processing productivity.
This work established a scalable, responsible multi-agent framework that now powers Sage’s vision for continuous accounting.
The Intelligent Workspace brings the entire AP lifecycle into one coordinated experience. It consolidates invoices, exceptions, approvals, vendor details, and intelligent insights into a single, actionable view—reducing navigation and making priorities immediately clear.
Key workflow moments showcased in this section:
How an invoice moves from capture to posting
How exceptions are surfaced, grouped, and explained
How approvals flow through the system with reduced friction
How the workspace adapts to vendor anomalies, duplicate detection, or missing documentation
How the interface highlights next steps and system confidence levels
This section highlights the evolution from early wireframes to refined designs and demonstrates how the workspace supports both high-volume AP teams and controllers responsible for auditability and compliance.
Designing for AP required a deep understanding of finance workflows, system constraints, and human decision-making. These foundations shaped every aspect of the Intelligent Workspace:
Pain Points Identified
Fragmented workflows across multiple pages
Lack of transparency in automation decisions
Manual triage of exceptions and approvals
Limited visibility into risk, vendor issues, and anomalies
User Roles & Context
The design supports AP Clerks, AP Managers, Controllers, and CFOs—each with different needs around accuracy, auditability, and throughput.
Constraints & Requirements
Must support high-volume processing with minimal error
Must maintain audit trails and compliance (SOX, GAAP)
Must ensure human-in-the-loop for approvals and risk decisions
Must provide clear explainability for all automation events
Design Principles
Clarity: Make priorities, exceptions, and next steps explicit
Trust: Provide explanations, confidence levels, and decision transparency
Momentum: Reduce friction and surface work in context
Resilience: Support edge cases and finance complexity without overwhelming users
These foundations ensured the experience balanced automation with financial rigor.
The Intelligent Workspace became a cornerstone for Sage’s shift toward AI-driven automation in accounting. It delivered measurable improvements and laid the groundwork for an extensible multi-agent ecosystem.
Product & Workflow Impact
50–90% reduction in manual data entry
2–3× increase in AP processing productivity
Faster exception resolution through prioritized insights
Improved approval turnaround times with clearer routing and context
Organizational Impact
Established the interaction model for Sage’s emerging AI Agents
Created reusable patterns for explainability, confidence scoring, and intelligent recommendations
Unified AP and PO processes into a single system view adopted across product, engineering, and AI teams
Strategic Impact
Accelerated Sage’s vision for continuous accounting
Demonstrated how agent-driven workflows can reduce operational friction
Provided a blueprint for deploying AI responsibly in high-compliance environments
This work not only transformed the AP experience but also shaped the foundation for Sage’s broader finance automation strategy.
