Value Systems Thinking

Value Systems Thinking is the mindset, the strategic framework, the new way of seeing. It’s the paradigm shift that says, “to truly connect with your customers, you need to understand them not as a persona, but as a complete, interconnected system of motivations, beliefs, and conversations.” It answers the question, “How should we think?

To do this, we’ve developed a proprietary methodology called Value Architecture. It’s a rigorous, data-driven process for deconstructing customer feedback to reveal this underlying system.

And the engine that makes this all possible is our Value Architect platform, the only tool in the world designed to put the power of Value Systems Thinking directly into your hands.

Mindset and Strategic Framework

Value Systems Thinking is a strategic framework for understanding and designing customer experiences. It moves beyond isolated metrics and siloed analyses to reveal the customer as a complete, dynamic system of motivations, beliefs, and conversational focuses.

At its core, it is the practice of looking at the interconnected relationship between:

  • The WHY: A customer’s deep, underlying motivations (their Core Drives).
  • The HOW: The cognitive frameworks they use to understand the world (their Mental Models).
  • The WHAT: The specific topics and conversations that are top-of-mind for them (their Discourse).

Instead of viewing these as separate data points, Value Systems Thinkings’ holistic approach allows businesses to stop just reacting to customer feedback and start architecting experiences that resonate with the whole person.

The Methodology

Value Architecture

We implement Value systems thinking through our proprietary Value Architecture methodology, a rigorous, data-driven process for deconstructing customer feedback to reveal 3 underlying and interconnected value systems.

Core Drive fingerprints reveal segments who share a common model of core drives based on 7 dimensions of motivation

Mental model fingerprints reveal segments who share a common set of entities, rules, and analogies that describe how your product or service works

Topic discourse fingerprints reveal segments who appraise a similar combination of topics about your product or service