Agentic AI vs. Generative AI: A Friendly Q&A for Business Leaders

Welcome, everyone, to another Topper Tuesday! I’m thrilled to introduce our first guest blogger, Maya Vijayakumar! Maya and I have worked together before when I was CDO of Chico’s FAS. I can’t say enough about her curiosity, expertise, and just being a fantastic human, and a great sense of humor to boot. When I saw her post on Agentic & Generative AI, I knew I had to invite her for a chat, and she graciously agreed. So, Maya, let’s jump right in!

Maya: Thanks, Jay! Super excited to be here and talk about one of my favorite topics—AI that actually helps us get stuff done.

What is Generative AI, in simple terms?

Jay: Maya, let’s start with the basics. What is Generative AI, at its simplest?

Maya: Think of Generative AI as your creative buddy. You give it a prompt—maybe “write a catchy product description” or “design a fun logo”—and it whips up something brand new for you. It’s super versatile, creating text, images, code, or even music, all based on what it’s learned from massive amounts of data.

Jay: So, you ask for content, and it’s right there at your fingertips. That’s pretty powerful for any business!

What about Agentic AI? How would you explain that?

Maya: Agentic AI is like having your own proactive personal assistant. Instead of just reacting to your requests, it takes the initiative. It can plan out a whole strategy, break down complex tasks into steps, and figure out how to get things done—all with minimal input from you.

Jay: That’s super easy to understand. So, Agentic AI is an agent that actually works for you, performing real tasks and making decisions!

Can you compare the two—maybe like a “contract” between them?

Maya: Absolutely! Here’s how I see it:

• Generative AI is your one-click wonder. You give it a prompt, and it delivers creative content. It’s great for isolated tasks, but doesn’t remember what you did yesterday or pick up where you left off.
• Agentic AI remembers your context and can work across multiple sessions. It can use all kinds of tools—databases, APIs, even robots—to tackle challenges. It’s like giving your AI a Swiss Army knife.

Jay: So, Generative AI is the artistic genius, and Agentic AI adds project management skills and a can-do attitude!

Maya: Exactly! Together, they form an unbeatable duo. Generative AI creates, Agentic AI does.

Can you give us some business examples?

Jay: Let’s see these concepts in action, through the eyes of a product owner or business leader. Maybe something like merchants and inventory management?

Maya: Sounds great !! Let’s try. 

Generative AI example:

Imagine you’re a site merchant. Generative AI can automatically write product descriptions tailored to your brand and customer personas. It can even evolve those descriptions over time to boost SEO and conversion rates. The best part? It learns from results and competitors, so your product pages are always fresh and optimized for traffic and sales.

Agentic AI example:

Now, think about the inventory or supply chain manager. Agentic AI acts like a proactive team member. It monitors inventory and sales in real time, foresees potential stock shortages, automatically orders more or moves inventory between locations, and adapts instantly to disruptions (like weather or customer demand). With more transactional intelligence, it can even recommend initial inventory positions and placements, streamlining operations further. This is a huge win for both revenues and margins.

Wrapping up

Jay: Maya, thank you for making this so clear and relatable! It’s amazing how these two types of AI can work together to drive real business results.

Maya: My pleasure, Jay! Keeping it simple means keeping it real—and that’s what business leaders need.

For a deeper, more technical dive into Agentic AI, check out Episode 4 of Chiefly Digital, where I interview the brilliant Jenna Flateman Posner!

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If the strength and capabilities of AI sound like the kind of teammate your ops team could use, we’ve got good news. fabric’s AI-powered OMS puts that intelligence to work—optimizing inventory, automating actions, and unlocking serious margin wins. Let’s talk.

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