The Future is Now: Xerocon Brisbane 2025

What a week! We are back in Singapore, feeling energised and inspired after two incredible days Sept 3-4 at Xerocon Brisbane 2025. It was a whirlwind of reconnecting with partners, making new friends, and getting a first-hand look at the future of accounting.

This year, the announcements from Xero were bigger than ever. The central theme was undeniable: Agentic AI is no longer a far-off concept. It's here, and it’s beginning to be embedded directly into the tools we use every day.

What does this mean for you and your business? Here is what we’re most excited about:

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“Just Ask Xero” (JAX) Gets a Major Upgrade

After a slow start to the AI frenzy in the past couple of years, Brisbane 2025 was the year Xero really got to show what they had been working on. The biggest announcement was "Just Ask Xero" or JAX. Introduced last year with limited functionality, we saw JAX’s potential as a powerful, chatbot-style agent integrated within Xero. Powered by OpenAI, JAX can securely access your financial data to provide real-time, contextual insights.

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Imagine being able to ask plain-English questions like:

• "Why are my transport expenses trending 15% higher this quarter?"
• "Which clients are taking the longest to pay their invoices?"
• "Based on my future cash flow, can I afford to buy a new van next month?"

JAX’s promise is that it can now drill down into your data to provide these answers, turning raw numbers into actionable business intelligence for making faster, more informed decisions.

JAX will be rolling out over the coming months and we can’t wait to get our hands on it for testing to really see what it can do. We’re excited and glad that after a slow start, Xero seems to be once again leading the way in accounting tech. It’s equal parts exciting, but daunting, but also inevitable, and we’ve got to keep up to understand how this may change our role as accountants.

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Homepage Upgrades: Custom Dashboards & Scorecards

We’re excited for this, and it should provide a lot of quick wins for our current clients on Xero and another reason for those not on Xero to switch. Finally, you’ll be able to customise Xero’s dashboards with different widgets to highlight key metrics that matter to your business, without having to add on or log in to another software.

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You’ll soon be able to see the story behind your numbers the moment you log in to Xero. Upcoming custom dashboards will allow you to track the key drivers of your business with charts and graphs tailored to your specific needs. You'll even be able to create performance scorecards directly within Xero, a feature that previously required add-on applications.

This means the metrics that matter most to you: be it sales trends, cash flow, or project profitability, will be front and centre, helping you stay focused on your goals.

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Our Role is Evolving

One of the most exciting and disruptive developments was the emergence of AI-powered bank reconciliation. We saw three different solutions, including Xero's own, designed to automate one of the most time-consuming tasks in bookkeeping.

This signals a fundamental shift in our industry. As Rebecca Buchanan of Straight Up Bookkeeping noted, "speeding up tasks isn’t the same as saving time." These tools don’t just alleviate our workload; they expand our capabilities. Our role is evolving from preparers of accounts to reviewers of AI-driven work.

The next twelve months is going to be a time of massive change, and again we need to keep testing these new features to understand where the limits are, and what an accountant’s role will be. While an AI can match transactions, it can’t provide the judgment and strategic oversight that a human can. We still need to be reviewing the outputs for accuracy. We still need to ensure all documentation meets IRAS record-keeping requirements, and not just allow the AI to auto-code.

We still need to provide the crucial human layer of trust, clarity, and peace of mind.

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Beyond the Tech: Insights on Time and Leadership

Of course, the best tools are only as effective as the people and processes behind them. Xerocon also offered profound insights into building better practices and better businesses.

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A massive highlight was an inspiring speech from Joe Brumm, creator of Bluey; a seven year old who has a younger sister Bingo, who live in Queensland and happen to be dogs (Blue Heelers). Joe spoke about his own journey, how Bluey was born, about finishing what you started, and how a little hard work never hurt anyone. Matt’s daughters love Bluey and were fortunate to visit Bluey’s World days earlier!

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Time management expert Kate Christie reminded us that we can't manage time; we can only invest it. The key is to focus our energy on high-value tasks. Those that are core to our role, generate revenue, and align with our goals, while delegating or eliminating low-value activities.

And in a powerful session on leadership for Xero Platinum Partners, Matt Church spoke about creating "islands of sanity" and the importance of "presence over productivity." His message was clear: leadership isn't about having all the answers. It's about how you make people feel in your presence; creating psychological safety and holding space for your team to thrive.

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Fun Times and Great Atmosphere

Of course, it would not be Xerocon without making connections, having some fun, and joining some side events!

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We played some pickleball (and lost badly), snakes and ladders, went hunting for merch, got a colour analysis for our wardrobe, loaded up on free coffees, and enjoyed local Australian delicacies like the classic sausage sizzle, crocodile skewers, grilled barramundi, and ice-blocks.

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To close, Matt’s kids were smuggled in for the final couple hours to experience the atmosphere, watch a closing Samba performance, get busy with some arts and craft, and generally get to see what accountants get up to!

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Planning for Future Harvests

A speaker at the conference said it best: “Relevance isn’t inherited. It’s earned.”

At Harvest Accounting, we are committed to earning that relevance every day. We are embracing these new technologies not to replace the human element, but to enhance it. We aim to use these powerful tools to help you navigate the path ahead, turning your financial data into the wisdom you need to grow your business.

We left Brisbane with more than just a glimpse of new software features. We left with a reinforced sense of purpose and inspiration, especially from connecting with fellow attendees and other highly regarded and innovative firms. As AI automates more and more of the mundane, our human skills; critical thinking, judgement, and genuine connection, become more valuable than ever.

We look forward to testing these new tools, sharing our ideas with our team, and finally, helping our clients the best we can to Harvest Together.

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