EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS OF AN ECONOMIC PROCESS USING SMART APPLICATIONS: DEVELOPING PROFESSIONAL ACCOUNTING SKILLS TO SUPPORT MANAGEMENT DECISIONS

The digital transformation of the finance function has shifted the focus from retrospective reporting to near real-time analysis of end-to-end business processes. Process intelligence - an ecosystem of technologies that combines process mining, business process management, and advanced analytics - enables a granular understanding of how actual processes are executed, as well as their impact on time, money, or quality variables. In this general framework, transactional economic processes such as Order-to-Cash (O2C), Purchase-to-Pay, or Record-to-Report become prime candidates for digital analysis. Starting from a select core of recent works on process intelligence technologies (with a focus on SAP Signavio) and digital accounting skills, the article summarizes how these technologies can support managerial decision-making and reconfigure the role of the accounting professional. The paper proposes a four-layer conceptual framework - economic processes and data, process analytics through process intelligence, digital accounting skills, and decision-making mechanisms. The conclusions drawn argue for the need to develop a profile of digital skills specific to process mining for accountants, as well as a "financial digital twin" of the O2C process, capable of explicitly linking insights to financial KPIs and managerial decisions. The proposed exploratory perspective aligns with the article’s central objective by illustrating how intelligent applications can convert transactional data into meaningful managerial insights. Furthermore, the study emphasizes the increasing necessity for accounting professionals to acquire advanced digital competencies that allow them to operate, interpret, and critically evaluate process intelligence outputs.