The Roots of Value: How You and Your Company May be Destroying Your Wealth

Why Should I Care about Value?

We seek what we destroy and we destroy what we seek: such is value’s danger. Understanding value will not only make you and your company rich: it will moreover make you comprehend what wealth actually is – so you end the cycle of inadvertent value destruction.

When you hear the word “value” – multiple associations arise: money, treasure, wealth, desire, riches, and gold. However, most definitions miss the mark. Not only is value core to Valuxr’s branding, we also believe it is one of the most dangerously misunderstood words in our economy.

In fact, we’d argue every historical economic problem can be sourced to value’s mismanagement. Thoughts seed outcomes. The way we treat a word often depicts our actions concerning said word – and we have seen how altered perceptions of value have impacted lives and businesses.

Misusing value could not only tank your company and career, but also your relations. It goes even deeper. Understanding value is not merely something necessitating your societal role – but also every breath.

Read on for an opportunity to unlock one of the most obvious – yet ignored – patterns in human behavior and perhaps enrich every action you take: honing in on a secret few understand regarding the unchangeable nature of value.

What is Value?

The Cambridge Dictionary defines value as the “amount of money that can be received for something.” Meanwhile, Merriam-Webster codifies value to be an object’s “relative worth, utility, or importance”. Both definitions are superficially satisfactory. But – as words represent infinitesimal nuance behind meaning – neither divulge the full patterned secret behind value’s duality.

Like most words, we have a semblance of truth within its daily connotation. So, let’s investigate how we naturally use the word.

How People Use the Word Value.

To unlock the truth behind value, diagnosing how business and family leaders throw around the term helps us trace back the lost meaning behind their behaviors. Let’s examine two use cases. Most people use value as an emotive representation of what captures a part of themselves.

“I value you” – applying the verb form – can subjectively range from a romantic admission from a loved one to a professional statement of worth from an employer. “That has value” – applying the noun form – is a statement of objectivity: personal or shared worth behind something that has been attributed – akin to a label placed on a box for all to see.

Already, there’s a contrast: a subjective action and an objective state. The latter is especially true when it comes to the monetary definition. Could there be a meaning bridging the two together?

What Value Really Is.

Value is the amount we choose to love. Love – another misused word – is not mere affection: it’s what we lay any portion of ourselves down for. We can love terrible things and wonderful things: but all people love something. Ergo, value is the amount of our finite time and self – thoughts, mind, soul, and strength – we choose to exchange.

Ergo, value is the amount of our finite time and self – thoughts, mind, soul, and strength – we choose to exchange.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Pay attention to the next part. Pay… attention. Do you see it? Even the verb describing how you dedicate time has roots in currency.

How is Valuxr’s definition of value any different from Cambridge, Marriam-Webster, or the connotations likely in your mind? The secret is in the word exchange. There can be one-sided love. But when two people love something – value is born.

Value is Reflexive

Herein lies one of the most fundamental, yet ignored, secrets of all time: value is reflexive. Previous definitions only capture half of the picture.

When two or more humans stare each other in the eye and see themselves reflecting back – this is an unspoken exchange representing value’s core meaning. When traders exchange goods, this – again – reflects value. It’s not ourselves, it’s others imparting on selves that births value.

If you notice – our logo is a reflection. This was intentional. Just as man reflects the glory of his Creator (Genesis 1:26-27), value cannot exist without another.

If a human were in a hypothetical void with only his or her material hoard – their heart might bestow the same greedy love it once held, but it would never reflect back onto themselves. What they love has no value. Neither does this hypothetical poor wretch bear any fruitful value – rendering a misanthrope.

Value’s assignment is subjective – sourced from this world’s subjects – but its existence is objective – ascertainable to the world’s objects. This has profound implications. Foremost of all: value is the cornerstone of all commerce and economy. Our economy’s cornerstone is reflexive: ergo, it’s relational.

Why does this matter? Because something curious happens when we look at the self through the eyes of others. Our motives are no longer self-absorbed nor self-obsessed: but take the first step into objectivization. Value makes selfish desires take a step from the subjective heart into the objective world.

Value makes selfish desires take a step from the subjective heart into the objective world.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Given value brings the selfish into the selfless. This brings us to the question – how can value be measured and multiplied?

How is Value Measured?

Caput. That’s how. Value is thought to be measured in capital. “Capital” – a word deriving from the Latin “caput” – means head. Just as a physical capital governs society, “head” also denotes the temple housing our body’s executive organ. Decisions are not merely a part of our physiology – they lay down the cornerstone for value’s metrics.

Just as our brain’s prefrontal cortex commands and decides our navigation through space and time, capital associates value with organizational decision-making.
Money is the most common and quantifiable capital form.

What is Money?

This question may seem simple – almost insulting. But, understanding what money is and what money isn’t is key to generating more of it.

Money is deferred value – tokenized. It transforms one sided material or service benefit into a mutual benefit: where the capital recipient has deferred benefit. Etymologically – it stems from the Latin “moneō”, meaning “to advise”. This is fitting – given money’s purpose is to carry value. not embody nor become value.

Money’s purpose is to carry value, not embody nor become value.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Money is not the root of all evil, but love of money is. Why does this matter? Because if we love money: we love a symbol more than what it represents. We love a shell of this world rather than its pearl. We worship the temple but not its God.

Our value then becomes purposeless – we become blinded and we follow the currents of vain existence rather than those creating and exchanging value. Our safety is then placed in the tightness of the chains this love carries rather than the freedom value holds.

This emptiness has consequences.

Value is Mismeasured

Value is not mismeasured because money nor capital are evil: it is mismeasured due to a surplus of money lacking meaning. Money is fickle. If everyone in the world no longer held confidence in the dollar – the dollar would lose its deferred value.

Value’s symbol relies on a variable source of fuel: faith. While most cite said faith as an attribution to a currency’s strength: it is moreover the faith in the collective value it represents that is more telling.

There may never be a truly accurate, objective means to measure value – given the innate, yet open, flux of value. Acknowledging this is the key to harnessing and amplifying the true purpose behind money.

Need for a Better Value Metric

While a perfect value metric remains impossible for us subjective mortals, recognizing our propensity to ignore the transactional two-sidedness behind value is our first step towards fully capturing it. A better metric lies in value’s roots.

Value sources its name from the Proto-Indo-European root “wal-/val-“, meaning “strength” and “power”. Intriguingly, value’s relatives include “equivalent”, “validity”, “ambivalent, and “valence” – words commonly referencing a shared arithmetic pattern of duality: negatives and positives – when balanced – become equivalent.

What – then – are the two forces creating said valence? Honing in on this is key to translating these insights into actionable impacts.

Why your Company is Inadvertently Destroying Value.

None of the above truly matters without a business pivot. Lest this article be as superficial as value-devoid money. To understand actionable business changes – let’s diagnose how current organizations fall into value-destruction cycles.

User Deafness: Value’s Missing Half

Where is the heart of this destruction cycle? The product. Businesses are a hyper-focused environment – where generating revenue is not only crucial to pay the bills but also provide employee livelihoods.

An unintended consequence of this hyper-focus is ignoring the user to release the product. No company truly strives to ignore its customers nor users – lest they lose their self-interest. User ignorance is deafness that develops as a scaling side-effect.

User ignorance is deafness that develops as a scaling side-effect

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

How, though, can the product possibly ignore its user? Just as money loses its symbolic representation of deferred value, products easily lose their significance as user-valued objects or services. It’s human nature. Sadly, this happens naturally – and to every business. Every product and service is at risk.

Every product and service is at risk.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Heeding this is key to saving your company and, peradventure, your own career’s value propositions.

A Hardness of Heart

Why is stagnation so ubiquitous? Value destruction happens with product strategy-starved business growth. Typically, this happens at the startup phase.

Most startups are hyper-attentive to customer needs – given their survival depends on it. Customers one and two lay cornerstones for an edifice.

Once established – this can be difficult to change. As customer bases grow, customizations become untenable. No longer at the beck and call of the biggest accounts, assumptions and presumptions litter product strategy.

As customer bases grow, customizations become untenable

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Unending Jira backlogs from various sources build density. Said density births an anchor. Stagnating momentum eventually catches up with revenue and sinks companies to the bottom of the lake: an impact that comes with great surprise after immense success. Ironically, product-optimized fixation sadly yields value destruction.

What actually happens between the hyper-sensitive startup phase and this “hardness of heart” stage inviting value’s destruction? The same reasons belie a cluttered desk or littered closet. When a business understandably optimizes itself – it closes doors for vital feedback loops.

It becomes so easy living and breathing as a product or service that little time permits empathizing with why anyone ever bothers using said product or service to begin with. This lost accountability – drowned out with the unmanageable noise of more customers – is precisely how value and bank accounts can multiply.

How do I Make More Money?

That’s the wrong question. Again – nothing wrong with money in itself. But a desire, alone, to make money typically yields few returns. There is no issue, however, reverse engineering the question. If you want the leaves – or dollar bills – of a money tree: one must plant value first.

How do I make more value?

Now we’re talking. That aforementioned word – “accountability” – is key. While the “customer is always right” culture revolutionized front-end business-to-consumer interactions – it did little to impact the back-end innovation: value’s germination.

As mentioned before, constant customization is tons of work when the actual product might as well have been altogether something else. Why keep sweetening every tree’s apple when you can plant a sweeter apple?

Why keep sweetening every tree’s apple when you can plant a sweeter apple?

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Doesn’t that cost time we don’t have?

Herein lies a blunt and valid counter to this article’s premise: time. Yes, a sweeter apple would resolve constant modifications sweeting apples. But, customers want those sweet apples now. The sweeter apple tree costs years – and, once grown, may no longer be in demand.

There is a solution to this in a modern world. With the revolution in agile methodologies and quicker service deliveries comes the most vital reason for slowing down and the key to making more value – and thus – money: listening and pivoting.

The missing half of value.

User Experience (UX) is nothing new nor do we pretend to be its revolutionaries. However – we do believe it to be so integral to value that it is the second part of our name. Whether or not your company has a UX team: user experience is value’s missing half.

The agile revolution shortened product delivery cycles. Anthologies published every half decade became articles published every month. Monoliths became pebbles. Why? Many companies jumped on the agile bandwagon – but few truly understood the true reason to be agile.

Many companies jumped on the agile bandwagon – but few truly understood the true reason to be agile.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

User Research

Invariably, the reason is user research. When people think “UX”, many fallacies come to mind: pixel pushers (this won’t make you any friends), designers, artists, and – worst of all – those who make our product “look sexy”.

The true meaning is precisely the name: user…. experience – something that must be preposterous to fathom as a job description. At the end of the day, the ultimate question is: How can a team truly determine and design the entire user’s experience? The answer is simple: they can’t. At least – not without help.

Many job descriptions exist within UX – but most fall between a spectrum of designer and researcher. The latter is the most recent role, and perhaps a game changer: not only for companies, but for economic history.

Why? User experience designers thrive in the solution space while researchers inform the problem space.

User experience designers thrive in the solution space while researchers inform the problem space.

https://valuxr.com/the-roots-of-value

Design is – by definition – purposeful. Without the guardrails of user value, products and services lose any sense of their own purpose.

However, asking a designer to both research the problem and design the solution is inefficient and highly risky. Hence why user experience researchers entered the fold.

The UX Research Fallacy

Many companies hire UX researchers as an afterthought – without thinking much about the company structure this role requires. Good research is much like what journalism used to be: reporting with brutal veracity, regardless of any conflicts of interest.

The issue is that user research often reports to managers who place stakes in their designs or product success – introducing bias from day one. An askew problem space has disastrous consequences.

Getting the problem space wrong is as consequential as treating the artery that isn’t hemorrhaging. It can mean life or death for a business. User research is not merely a group dedicated to save your value destruction: but to inform why people even care to give your product their time and space.

The Value Solution

Don’t just hire more user researchers. Give them unmitigated access to your key complainers, and your key product changers. Moreover, provide a separation of powers: ensuring the most brutal truths never get diluted by product biases: which are as contagious as smallpox.

Lastly – give UX research the loudest channel possible to publicize and correct findings. You aren’t just stopping the bleeding of a value hemorrhage: you are rewiring the bleeding artery back to the heart of your product strategy in a move that will destroy any and all monetary stagnation.

This isn’t a revolution. This isn’t brain surgery nor rocket science. It’s a relationship.

This is reintroducing revenue’s missing soul: restoring the fuel of human accountability to the engine of product value.