Digital illustration of a value creation tree with global network background.

Unlock Your Business Potential: Mastering Value Creation in the Modern Era

Samir D’Costa in Business & Economy August 2025 • 4 min read.

"Navigate the complexities of value creation in today's market. Discover strategies for sustainable growth and competitive advantage."

In the 21st century, the concept of 'value' has re-emerged as a critical focal point for businesses across all sectors. What was once a straightforward idea has evolved into a complex, multifaceted phenomenon that requires a deep understanding to harness effectively. Value is now recognized as a wide-ranging, everyday term used in various settings, its nuanced potential and conceptual understandings remain complex and significant.

The extensive span of understanding value—be it from a populist, technical, academic, institutional, or policymaking perspective—creates a rich and diverse domain for exploration and analysis. Understanding these various viewpoints is essential for businesses aiming to create sustainable value for themselves and their customers.

The academic and business communities have long been interested in the notion of value, yet in contemporary business, value creation often aligns with specific areas like marketing and service-dominant logic (SDL). Value can be viewed as a simple identifier or label—the price of a product, but this view risks limiting a deeper, more historical understanding of how value is created through labor, cost, and profit, drawing on classical economic analyses from figures like Marx, Smith, and Ricardo.

Redefining Value: Process-Driven Approach

Digital illustration of a value creation tree with global network background.

A modern perspective suggests that value should be aligned with a 'process' or 'processes'. This view emphasizes the importance of mindsets that foster value creation. Value takes on a more dynamic role, focusing on adding, evolving, becoming, and experiencing—turning the concept into an active, continuous endeavor.

This process-oriented approach transforms value development into a creative and developmental journey, not just an economic one. It is deeply influenced by the subjective perceptions within organizations, affecting everyone from individual contributors to entire teams. This holistic perspective ensures that value creation is both inclusive and reflective of the collective organizational mindset.

Here are some key elements of this approach:

Adding Value: Continuously seeking ways to enhance products, services, and customer experiences.
Evolving Value: Adapting to changing market needs and customer preferences.
Becoming Value: Transforming ideas and concepts into tangible assets.
Experiencing Value: Ensuring every interaction provides meaningful value.
Creating Value: Actively innovating and generating new sources of value.

Value exists at all levels within an organization, significantly influenced by whether individuals are actively engaged in the process of value creation. The efforts to integrate these perceptions are often seen in institutional and governmental initiatives, highlighting the need for a unified understanding of value definitions globally. Ultimately, it is crucial to determine whether value is inherent or a result of specific processes, and to focus efforts accordingly. Exploring these boundaries helps clarify what value truly means.

Embracing the Future of Value

In conclusion, value and value creation are enduring concepts that remain surprisingly relevant. As contexts change, influenced by geopolitical, market, technological, and ethical shifts, so too does the understanding of value. The coming years will require businesses to adapt and deepen their understanding of these dynamics to maintain a strategic edge. By embracing a comprehensive approach to value creation, businesses can better address and overcome the challenges of the modern era.

About this Article -

This article was crafted using a human-AI hybrid and collaborative approach. AI assisted our team with initial drafting, research insights, identifying key questions, and image generation. Our human editors guided topic selection, defined the angle, structured the content, ensured factual accuracy and relevance, refined the tone, and conducted thorough editing to deliver helpful, high-quality information.See our About page for more information.

This article is based on research published under:

DOI-LINK: 10.1177/2394964317731019, Alternate LINK

Title: Comments By Guest Editors

Subject: Marketing

Journal: Journal of Creating Value

Publisher: SAGE Publications

Authors: Sertan Kabadayi, Peter Stokes

Published: 2017-11-01

Everything You Need To Know

What is the core shift in understanding 'value' that businesses need to grasp in the 21st century?

In the 21st century, businesses must understand that 'value' is no longer a straightforward concept. It has evolved into a complex, multifaceted phenomenon. This requires a deeper understanding of how value is created, maintained, and perceived within the business and by the customer. The evolution means moving beyond simplistic views, such as price, to embracing the dynamic, process-driven nature of value that focuses on adding, evolving, becoming, and experiencing value across all levels of an organization.

How does a process-driven approach to value creation transform the way businesses operate?

A process-driven approach transforms value development into a creative and developmental journey. This perspective emphasizes the importance of mindsets that foster value creation, where value is added, evolved, becomes, and experienced. This approach is deeply influenced by subjective perceptions within organizations, affecting every individual from individual contributors to entire teams. This holistic perspective ensures that value creation is both inclusive and reflective of the collective organizational mindset, ensuring that all efforts are aligned toward creating meaningful customer experiences and sustainable business practices.

What are the key elements of a process-driven approach to value creation and how do they contribute to overall business strategy?

The key elements of a process-driven approach include: Adding Value, Evolving Value, Becoming Value, Experiencing Value, and Creating Value. Adding Value involves continuously enhancing products, services, and customer experiences. Evolving Value means adapting to changing market needs and customer preferences. Becoming Value is about transforming ideas into tangible assets. Experiencing Value ensures every interaction provides meaningful value, and Creating Value actively innovates and generates new sources of value. These elements, when integrated, allow businesses to be more adaptable, customer-focused, and innovative, leading to sustainable growth and a competitive advantage.

Why is understanding different perspectives on 'value' (populist, technical, academic, etc.) crucial for business success?

Understanding the various perspectives on 'value', including populist, technical, academic, institutional, and policymaking views, is essential for businesses. These diverse perspectives create a rich domain for exploration and analysis, allowing businesses to gain comprehensive insights into value creation. By considering these viewpoints, businesses can develop more effective strategies for creating sustainable value, understanding customer needs, and adapting to changes in the market. This holistic approach helps businesses align their internal processes with external expectations, ultimately leading to better outcomes.

In what ways can businesses prepare for the future of 'value' creation in the face of changing global dynamics?

Businesses can prepare for the future of value creation by adapting and deepening their understanding of value dynamics in response to geopolitical, market, technological, and ethical shifts. This involves embracing a comprehensive, process-driven approach to value creation. This approach must incorporate the key elements of adding, evolving, becoming, experiencing, and creating value. Businesses that can anticipate and respond effectively to these changes will be better positioned to maintain a strategic edge, address challenges, and achieve sustainable growth in the modern era. This requires continuous learning, flexibility, and a customer-centric approach to business operations.