Tailoring Success: Harnessing the Creational Affordances of Generative Artificial Intelligence to Drive Market Performance

The rapid evolution of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has revolutionized various industries through its creational affordances. However, the impact of these affordances on business outcomes remains underexplored. Drawing on the resource-based view, we examine the relationships among GenAI's creational affordances, customer orientation, customization, and market performance. Using survey data from 196 information technology (IT) firms in mainland China, we reveal that both product and service customization significantly mediate the positive relationship between GenAI's creational affordances and market performance. Furthermore, customer orientation merely enhances the mediation effect of service customization, underscoring its critical role in maximizing the strategic benefits of GenAI. We contribute to existing technology-driven operations management research by emphasizing the moderated mediation mechanism in the relationship between GenAI's creational affordances and market performance. Our findings not only assist IT firms in better implementing their AI strategies but also offer a reference for the development of other firms.