Design Thinking to Reinvent Values in a Business Model: a 4-Step Approach Using Ideation Virtual Tools

The purpose of this paper is to create and test design thinking approach sequence, to redene the value proposition. This paper suggests a 4-step systematic design thinking approach sequence to reinvent values in a business model, which was researched by a case study method. Based on the idea management approach the authors describe idea generation and evaluation processes by applying the design thinking approach and their possible moderation elements. Originality/value: a created approach could be applied by the organisations that would like to create new values or reinvent the existing ones in their business models value propositions.


Introduction
In last two decades the design thinking has emerged in various elds of the social sciences (Baker & Moukhliss). This design thinking movement has taken place in parallel with the development of theoretical approaches related to the concepts of the value chain and the business model.
An important theoretical basis for the value chain has been laid by Porters with the competition theory (1985), where the value is regarded with business processes and activities helping to achieve the competitive advantage.
The interpretation of the concept of values has expanded signi cantly in the context of the various characteristics of business models (DaSilva & Trkman, 2014). Teece (2010) clarifys that the business model is a hypothetical assumption on how a business creates, delivers, and captures the value, which is most appropriate and clear de nition of the nature of the value. The value proposition is the unique way of each business model on how to deliver and present the value to the customer in order to get revenues and capture the pro t (Teece, 2010). The value proposition not only includes the product or service offered by the company, but more importantly it explains what kind of the solution is offered to satisfy the needs or solve the issues of customers (Payne et.al., 2017;Osterwalder et.al., 2014).
In recent ten years the design thinking methods are linked to the scienti c discourse on the value creation, delivery and capturing in the sustainable and circular business models (Uvarova et.al, 2020;Geissdoerfer et.al, 2016). The topicality of business model studies and how to create values involving different stakeholders in business models (Andreassen et al., 2018;Simberova & Kita, 2020) has grown from both academics and practitioners' sides. Comparing to traditional business models, the sustainable business models assume the value proposition not just to customers, but, also, to various stakeholders, incorporating economic, social, and environmental values (Geissdoerfer et.al, 2016;Bocken et.al, 2013) thus re ecting the sustainable transition process (Uvarova et.al, 2021;Jonker et.al., 2020).
According to Geissdoerfer and his co-authors (2016) the use of design thinking methods in the value innovation process provides an opportunity to create new types of value, as well as to expand the range of different stakeholders to whom the value proposition can be addressed. At present, the value innovation is not only an issue for some practitioners, but an important priority for the top management of companies, where creative and design thinking methods play a promising role as offer an effective approach for the ideation of new values (Leavy, 2010).
As a consequence, organisations have started to seek for systematic approaches how to de ne and rede ne the values. This paper provides a new sequence of the design thinking approach as the answer to this demand.
To invent something new or reinvent something existing the start position is an idea. Idea management helps to provide more effective and e cient idea generation, evaluation and selection processes (Brem & Voigt, 2007), plus there are many versions of brainstorming to support the creative idea generation (Bonnardel & Didier, 2020). The authors have described idea generation and evaluation processes on the basis of idea management approach and have applied design thinking to create the sequence of the approaches incorporated in the idea management process.
Moreover, the design thinking methodology was adopted to current Covid-19 pandemic circumstances of the remote work. The ideation sessions have been adapted to the virtual environment using various digital tools to moderate and encourage group ideation sessions. The proposed methodology utilises the design sprint approach which is extremely important to engage in the active ideation process and keep the attention of remote participants in the virtual sessions. The design sprint is linked to the digital context and provides the ability to run experimental and brainstorming sessions across multiple iterations in a digital environment (Magistretti et.al, 2020).
Design thinking seems to play an important role in innovating and establishing a successful new business model (Guldmann et al., 2019;Sokolic, 2015). Another rationale is that design thinking is a human centred approach, that includes the generation of many ideas, and the adoption of a fastprototyping approach (Foster, 2021).
In the researched case, an organisation aims to create a value proposition by generating a lot of versions, involving a lot of stakeholders and in the end value de nitions will be created and veri ed. Based on the idea management approach the authors describe idea generation and evaluation processes by applying design thinking approach and their possible moderation elements that could be appertained to an organisation to nd new or reinvent existing value propositions.
The purpose of the paper is to create and test a design thinking approach sequence to rede ne the value propositions of the company. So, this paper presents a 4-step systematic design thinking approach sequence to reinvent values in a business model.

Methodological Framework
This research is based on the qualitative research methods, combining the literature review, the action research with the ideation sessions using the design thinking methods, the focus group discussions, and the descriptive analyses in order to synthesise the results of the research, implications and future research issues. The methodological framework of this research is presented in the Figure 1, illustrating main stages of the research, the literature and data sources, as well as digital tools used.
The action research allows the experimentation with the theory in a real work of organisations and deepen the views and opinions about the enablers and obstacles of the intervention, solutions or activities performed (Somekh, 2005). This combination of the theory and practice is done with the simultaneous interaction between researchers and practitioners, ensuring the co-work within the sequenced activities of the situation analyses, the experimentation, and the systematic intervention activities, analysing and describing the practices applied, gathering the feedback, and reviewing the lessons learned (Avison et.al, 2008). The action research provides the methodological framework for researching the changing situation and innovation processes (Somekh, 2005). This type of the research is particularly relevant in current circumstances as the organisations and their surrounding environment has experienced signi cant changes stimulated by the Covid-19 pandemic and leading to new forms of the remote work, a rapid digital leap forward, but also nourishing the social distance between employees, customers, and other stakeholders. Furthermore, the European countries encounter the green transformation towards sustainability goals aiming to change the lifestyle and consumption behaviour of the society, the value orientation of organisations, foster the emergence of a new ecosystem with the open cooperation of various stakeholders addressing the sustainability issues. The action research provides the possibility to test the feasibility and nature of new ideas (Kaplan, 1998) that in the context of this study ensured greater options to test and advocate new values generated during the interaction sessions with involved participants. Moreover, the involved participants later become as knowledge ambassadors or more "skilled implementers" (Kaplan, 1998 -1p.) that can promote both new values and new skills of innovating these values within their organisation.
According to Somekh (2005), this study assumed eight methodological principles of the action research as presented in the Table 1. Table 1 Methodological principles of the action research applied within this study In this paper, the de nition of the idea management is based on the following assumptions: a systematic and manageable process with 2 main parts: idea generation, evaluation, and a repeated idea generation and evaluation (if it is needed) (Mikelsone et al., 2019).
Since 2000, design thinking has become academically topical and has been increasingly applied to novel challenges practically (Baker & Moukhliss, 2020), in this case this approach will be applied to de ne value propositions for a company. In this paper the authors apply the de nition that design thinking is a human centred approach, that includes the generation of many ideas, and the adoption of a fast prototyping approach (Foster, 2021). In this research the design thinking will be included through the design thinking approaches, for example, Persona -a persona method identifying a persona needs and desires (Chasanidou et al., 2015;Stickdorn & Schneider, 2010) and also creative thinking methods, like, Mind Mapping (Wycoff, 1991), Trend watching methods (Trendwatching, 2021) and others.
The case study was conducted in a medium-sized company located in Latvia with more than 50 employees (according to the EU recommendation 2003/361). The company works in the eld of innovation and investment consultations. The company stated a necessity to rede ne the value propositions. During 8-hour session 20 managers were involved, but additionally it was required to receive ideas and evaluation also from other employees and partners. The case study process was de ned in several process steps (see in Table 2). 5. The desk review of documents and information gathered within a practical session.
6. The content analysis of materials of a practical session.
7. The descriptive analyses of the preparation, performance and the evaluation of a practical session.

Source: developed by the authors
The preparation for a session aimed to rede ne the values and it included 2 meetings within the organization. The rst meeting was organized to understand the company's needs in detail, the second one to approve a session plan. Before the second session a detailed research on possible approaches of design thinking was caried out to reach the aims of the company. The authors have evaluated more than 20 approaches to select and combine the approach to reach the aim.
In a pre-session, prior to the rst meeting, an additional issue was discovered that during an 8-hour session only 20 managers of the company would be able to participate, but the company demanded the additional involvement of more than 100 employees and partners. That was the reason why the research team decided to create the pre and post sessions. During the pre-session the list of more than 50 values that were mentioned in the company's documents, strategies and normative acts was created and given for evaluation to the employees. So, the session started with the development of highly evaluated values. The preparation of the value list itself was separate research that is not described in this paper. The post session was conducted to evaluate and improve the created de nitions of the value propositions. This is an additional recommendation for a moderation -if during a main session resource do not allow to involve all possible stakeholders, there is a possibility to create a pre (generation) and post sessions (evaluation).
In the Key insights the authors describe the sequence of created and tested practical session.

Results
A 4-step systematic design thinking method's sequence was made to rede ne the values in a business model. Before step 1 there might have been some systematic idea collection from the strategic documents, the organisation's visions etc. and/or idea generation of new values by employees or other stakeholders.
The step 1 is a warm-up (Figure 2), it helps to understand a customer. STEP 4 -EVALUATE THE VALUES -during this step all created value descriptions were copy pasted to this step and the same values were merged as one. Only 4 values were merged and then all value descriptions were evaluated according to their innovativeness and simplicity. There were no ideas in ''Black hole',' so this approach led to promising value propositions. There were 2 -NOW ideas -simple but traditional values, but all other values were very innovative. 6 -HOW ideas that were complex for implementation, but 4 -WOW ideas were easy to implement. By using this approach the company's aim was reached to de ne 4 value descriptions that would be innovative but simple for implementation. All created descriptions were given for public evaluation and the same values got the support.
After the session the participants and managers approved that it was unexpected 8 hours of a playful process that led to serious results. An additional note that this process was moderated in Zoom and Miro environments, but it could be also moderated over face-to-face sessions.

Discussion
This paper offers a systematic 4-step process to rede ne the values. The aspiration of the design thinking approach is to provide a more systematic view on how to get to the best possible values by creating and evaluating them.
The adoption of the action research methodological framework and results gained generated new knowledge available for wider range of stakeholders inside and outside the organisation involved within the research. Somekh (2005) believe that this new knowledge and experience can be potentially useful in other contexts and settings of changing situations within this organisation or even outside its' boundaries.
A key practical implication is related to the possibility to use created sequences' templates for the value creation or reinvention process. The approach may help organisations' and enterprises' innovators who desire to create a more systematic and playful value creation process. As a result, a decision-maker will have more values to choose from while inventing new or reinventing existing business models. Design thinking and idea management may provide far more quality and playfulness to the complex innovative processes of inventing new and reinventing established values in business models.
A key theoretical implication is related to the new combination and modi cation of design thinking approaches to adapt them to this speci c aspect of business models -a value reinvention. It may be possible to include this 4-step approach as one perspective for understanding how to design and develop business models values.
The further researches could explore the potential and effectiveness of diverse stakeholders' involvement in the value creation or a reinventing process. It may be that each of these insights play an important role in the value creation or a rede ning process. . We may need to reconsider the idea management as a part not only to create business models but also as the process that could keep it up-to-date all the time.
An additional question is how this approach works in real-life sessions, because in this case it was applied in a web-based session. The results were very good, but there are a lot of discussions that technologies destroy creativity (Edwards, 2001;Todd, 2003;Hoffmann et al., 2016), but maybe in a systematic and well-managed idea management process with the design thinking approach it can boost it.

Conclusions
The application of design methods in the existing remote work environment has created new challenges for the virtual moderation of design thinking and ideation sessions. Digital tools help to develop attractive and engaging methods for active participation within the ideation sessions of new values. The design sprint and gaming elements integrated within the design thinking methods helps to keep the attention and engagement of participants in the longer (e.g. 8-hour) ideation sessions.
Our ndings reveal that this 4 -step sequence of design thinking methods enhance the participants ability to reinvent values.
The action research approach applied allowed the close cooperation between researchers and practitioners to maximise the results of the ideation sessions. Moreover, it stimulates the development of new knowledge among the practitioners on the design thinking methods applied. The participants of the 4 -step sequence of design thinking methods for reinventing the values became as the knowledge ambassadors on these methods and may further promote these approaches within their organisation.

Authors' contributions
Work has been divided equally among the authors. Authors read and approved the nal manuscript.

Authors' information
Ph.D. Elina Mikelsone, PostDoc researcher the founder of Idea Innovation Institute, a researcher, a lecturer and an entrepreneur. All areas of the author's life are related to innovation and idea management, at academic, professional and personal levels. The author has created non-formal learning module, namely the Fitness of Ideas for enterprises, where over the last 3 years took part more than 2000 participants. In 2021, the author has initiated a PostDoc project on idea management. Over the last 10 years, the author has consulted more than 400 enterprises on innovations and idea management. Elina is the author of more than 20 scienti c articles, several book chapters and a reviewer in several scienti c journals. Inga Uvarova, PhD candidate in business administr., a researcher and an assistant professor at BA School of Business and Finance (Latvia), as well as an experienced research and development lead at ArtSmart ltd. She has been a Team leader of approx. 10 researches and a key researcher of approx. 20 researches in last 10 years. She is an author of publications in the eld of the circular economy, circular business models and innovation. Her research interests also relate to sustainability of various industries and business model innovations, support and green nance issues. I.Uvarova has developed various concepts for developing greenway and other eco tourism projects.
Dr. Jean-Pierre Segers holds a PhD from the Université de Liège (Belgium). He is a visiting professor at Riga Technical University in Latvia (Faculty of Engineering Economics and Management) and Hasselt University (Faculty of Business Economics) in Belgium. His research interests include pharma and (new) biotechnology rms; open innovation; regional systems of innovation; entrepreneurship; EntEd; ecosystems and innovation districts; Business Models.

Availability of data and materials
All research data is openly accessible within Idea Innovation Institute, to access data contact: mikelsone.elina@gmail.com. Step 3 "Enrich the value de nitions" of the 4-step Sequence of Design Thinking to Reinvent Values, source: created by authors Step 4 "Evaluate the values" of the 4-step Sequence of Design Thinking to Reinvent Values, source: created by authors