COBOL dev won .Net hackathon with help from AI – and their CIO loves it

Mark Sawade, the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Australia's taxation office (ATO), is encouraging administrative staff to utilize Microsoft's Copilot for routine tasks in an effort to enhance skills and foster ideas that could ultimately improve the core services. Speaking at Gartner's annual IT Symposium, Sawade highlighted that the ATO has been implementing forms of machine learning and deep analytics for fraud detection over the past decade.

However, generative or agentic AI is not yet permitted for these critical processes. Copilot is being used to expedite everyday activities, with the ultimate goal of increasing AI literacy and potentially leading to advancements in AI-powered core processes. Although Sawade does not anticipate a significant improvement in efficiency or a clear return on investment, he believes this strategy can yield a "return on employee" by developing the necessary skills to optimize business processes.

The ATO's developer team supports this approach, as evidenced by an internal hackathon where a COBOL developer won the competition after employing GitHub Copilot. Despite having no prior experience with C# or the .Net framework, the developer demonstrated the potential for generative AI to transcend boundaries and work in unfamiliar domains.

Sawade has ambitious plans for AI, envisioning improvements similar to the reduction in time required to complete paper-based tax returns, which were six hours in the 1990s, now taking only 12 minutes with the ATO's app and online service. He also mentioned personal agents that could remind taxpayers to file annual returns and assist in their preparation.

However, achieving such advancements remains a distant goal due to identity-related hurdles. For now, Sawade is cautious about rushing into the implementation of AI, emphasizing the importance of setting clear goals and working backwards to increase automation.