From compliance overhead to working AI in a single day with JLGM

Challenge

For JLGM & Co, compliance work was carrying a hidden tax. Before an accountant could apply any professional judgement to a job, they'd already spent an hour logging into Xero and the ATO portal, extracting financials and prefill data, and manually populating workbook templates. Multiply that across hundreds of jobs a year and the hours add up fast, spent on work that can be automated.

A second friction point compounded it. Information collection from clients ran almost entirely through email: manually drafted requests, manual follow-up when documents were missing, and no visibility for the client on what was still outstanding. The cycle was slow, repetitive, and frustrating for both sides.

These weren't novel problems. The firm had evaluated off-the-shelf tools and found them either too rigid or too expensive to customise. What they hadn't had was the space to define exactly what they needed, and the right people in the room to start building it.

What we did

Inlight ran JLGM & Co through a full-day AI Ignition Workshop, a structured process that takes a team from operational pain points to working prototypes and a business case in a single session.

The morning was spent mapping opportunity areas across the firm's workflows and generating ideas through structured ideation. The session surfaced a strong consensus quickly. The team agreed on their two highest-priority opportunities before lunch.

In the afternoon, the group split into build teams. With Inlight engineers and strategists in the room, each team built a working prototype of their chosen concept, produced a business case, and prepared a pitch. By 4:30pm, they had two prototypes ready to show the rest of the firm.

What they built

• Compliance Intelligence Agent
  The CIA automates the front end of every compliance job. An accountant selects a client, and the tool retrieves the correct workbook template and populates the Trial Balance, GST Reconciliation, Tax Reconciliation, and Franking Account sheets by pulling directly from Xero and ATO data, with every figure labelled by source. Before the accountant touches the file, the tool has already run a first-pass exception review. Non-deductible items, GST variances, depreciation treatment differences, and large year-on-year movements are flagged with plain-English explanations. For unresolved items, it drafts a client query email in the firm's tone of voice, ready to review and send. The prototype demonstrated the concept clearly. Turning it into secure production software is the next step, and the business case built on the day makes a compelling argument for doing so.
• Smart Info Request and Client Collection System
  A two-sided prototype that automates the information collection cycle between JLGM's accountants and their clients. On the internal side, the accountant selects a client and the system pre-loads context from prior year requests, entity structure, ATO prefill data, and Xero financials, generating a draft information request broken out by entity in minutes rather than from scratch. On the client side, instead of an email list with no guidance, the client receives a personalised checklist with instructions on where to find each item, a per-item upload function, and live visibility of what has been provided and what is still outstanding. Once sent, the system monitors responses automatically and surfaces draft follow-up messages for review, eliminating the manual chasing cycle.

Outcome

Inlight is now working with JLGM & Co to explore an MVP build of an internal workflow automation platform, taking the concepts proven on the day and turning them into something the whole firm can run on.

“Huge thank you for today. Still getting messages from the team with very positive feedback. We're excited to figure out how we extend the prototypes built today into working software.

Fraser Munro, Director, JLGM & Co

“It was engaging throughout the whole day and specific to our business, which was awesome. I definitely feel like a lot of the things we discussed could be implemented. I'm more than happy to help lead that change. I think it's going to set us up for a great future.

Ange, Accountant, JLGM & Co