Acumatica executives outlined plans to reduce workflow complexity through behavioral telemetry and AI-driven personalization during a roundtable discussion at Summit 2026 in Seattle, signaling a strategic shift from static interfaces requiring extensive training to adaptive systems that guide users through context-specific processes.
Chief product officer Jon Pollock emphasized Acumatica is aiming to compress workflows from 30 clicks down to five by analyzing how users navigate the platform and eliminating unnecessary steps through intelligent automation.
He described one of his main goals as CPO is to: “I want to understand the process and ensure it’s streamlined,” he says. “I want to reduce cycle time and endure we can react well and proactively. When something goes wrong, it’s not big changes; it’s a thousand small things.”
This approach addresses persistent adoption barriers in mid-market ERP implementations, where workflow complexity delays productivity gains and increases support costs.
For technology executives evaluating ERP platforms, the emphasis on telemetry-driven optimization represents a fundamental change in how vendors approach user experience design. Traditional ERP systems require organizations to adapt business processes to software constraints, while intelligent platforms analyze actual usage patterns to surface relevant features and streamline frequent tasks.
Outgoing CPO Ali Jani noted how product telemetry helps Acumatica understand where users struggle, enabling targeted in-product guidance rather than generic training programs disconnected from daily workflows.
The company’s AI Studio platform enables organizations to create individualized user personas reflecting different roles, skill levels and business contexts without extensive coding. This capability matters for mid-market organizations where employees often handle multiple functions, as personalized interfaces reduce cognitive load by displaying only relevant options rather than overwhelming users with enterprise-wide feature sets.
Vendor and Partner Portals Bridge Gap
Acumatica’s roadmap prioritizes vendor and partner portals as critical infrastructure connecting internal ERP operations with external ecosystem participants. Jani emphasized that portal functionality represents customer-facing capabilities requiring the same visibility and usability standards as internal tools, rather than secondary features receiving limited investment. This perspective aligns with broader enterprise recognition that partner self-service capabilities reduce coordination overhead while improving data accuracy compared to manual communication channels.
Technology leaders should evaluate ERP platforms based on portal integration depth with core financial, inventory and order management systems rather than standalone portal software requiring manual synchronization. When partners place orders through self-service portals, transactions should automatically update inventory availability, trigger fulfillment workflows and create financial records without human intervention. This real-time integration matters for organizations managing distributed partner networks, as disconnected systems create visibility gaps delaying decision-making and increasing working capital requirements.
Reducing Cycle Time, Improving Efficiency
Miten Mehta, chief engineering officer for Acumatica, emphasized cycle time reduction as a critical metric for evaluating ERP workflow improvements. Organizations achieving measurable cycle time reductions typically prioritize high-volume processes like purchase-to-pay, order-to-cash and production scheduling for initial automation efforts rather than attempting comprehensive workflow transformation simultaneously. This phased approach delivers faster ROI while building organizational confidence in ERP capabilities before tackling more complex processes.
Pollock stated AI capabilities have accelerated product management functions tenfold in how quickly teams can adapt to changing requirements, suggesting similar productivity gains available to customers leveraging intelligent automation.
Jani agreed, saying, “With AI Studio, what we’re doing is we have to code less and less. AI Studio provides more functionality and can change behavior.”
The company’s focus on subtle, contextual guidance rather than intrusive notifications reflects understanding that ERP adoption depends on systems enhancing existing workflows rather than disrupting them with constant alerts.
Jani says, “We’ve been at it for a long time. We look long-term. We have to understand the user. Need to not just understand the business, but the processes and procedures. Most importantly, the telemetry to understand their behavioral patterns and systems.”
What This Means for ERP Insiders
Behavioral telemetry transforms ERP user experience to continuous adaptive optimization. Acumatica’s commitment to analyzing usage patterns and compressing workflows from 30 to five clicks signals industry recognition that reducing interaction complexity matters more than feature breadth for driving adoption and productivity. ERP vendors must invest in instrumentation frameworks capturing user navigation patterns, task completion rates and abandonment points rather than relying on customer feedback surveys, fundamentally restructuring product development around empirical usage data. systems.
Portal parity with internal interfaces is becoming a strategic differentiator. Acumatica’s emphasis that vendor and partner portals deserve equal investment priority as internal ERP functionality reveals that mid-market organizations increasingly evaluate platforms based on ecosystem enablement capabilities rather than back-office features alone. Enterprise architects should prioritize ERP vendors demonstrating real-time portal integration with core transactional systems, role-based access frameworks supporting multiple partner types, and self-service capabilities reducing coordination overhead.
AI-driven workflow compression requires process instrumentation infrastructure. Pollock’s goal of reducing clicks through intelligent automation depends on platforms capturing granular interaction data at workflow step level, not just transaction outcomes stored in traditional ERP databases. System integrators and enterprise architects evaluating cloud ERP platforms must assess vendor telemetry capabilities, consent management frameworks, and data retention policies governing behavioral analytics before committing to intelligent automation roadmaps.
