What is Business Model ZEN?

Business Model ZEN is a methodology for designing and validating value propositions, delivery methods, revenue structures, and execution choices in a single integrated structure that starts with the customer.

Why should a business model be viewed from a customer-centric perspective?

A business model is a structure of choices that defines not only what a company will make, but also what value it will create and deliver to customers and how it will monetize that value. Starting with the customer’s problem and context therefore makes it possible to assess both differentiation and feasibility.

When can Business Model ZEN be used?

It can be used at stages where business concepts must be connected to market execution, including planning new businesses and products, redesigning existing businesses, assessing customer value and revenue structures, and validating hypotheses through a Lean Startup approach.

(DBR Article) Business Models: An Integrated, Multidimensional, Customer-Centric Approach

Only a customer-centric approach can differentiate a business model—

‘ZEN’: An Integrated Methodology for Building Business Models

Yongho Cho, CEO of Vision Arena brad.cho@visionarena.co.kr

<About the Author>

The author graduated from Dongguk University’s Department of Industrial Engineering and earned an MBA from Finland’s Aalto University School of Business. He has served as an advisor on government ICT industry policy and as an adjunct professor at Hanyang University. At Oracle Korea, Samil PwC, and other firms, he spent more than 10 years consulting on new e-business and mobile ventures and technology strategy. In 2010, he founded Vision Arena Co., Ltd. (visionarena.co.kr), a management consultancy specializing in platform strategy and business models, and currently serves as its principal consultant.

The ZEN Methodology

Take an integrated approach to concept, planning, and execution

Start with the customer and end with the customer

Incorporate a multidimensional strategic perspective

Build in iterative learning through repeated execution

Use existing innovation methodologies in an integrated way

Assess the attractiveness of the business model

Turn the business model into a cube

Why Business Model ZEN?

New business models have become a major topic for companies. Why are companies so interested in business models? Because a business model contains a concrete design aligned with the purpose of doing business. In this sense, a business model lays out a company’s business choices (Choice) and the relationships among them: how it will create and deliver customer value and then monetize it. Several years ago, while coaching a professional training program for service planners for about a year, I taught a methodology that was unfamiliar at the time but is now reasonably well known. One realization I had then was that a business model is subordinate to its concept. Moreover, as the recent Lean Startup movement shows, the success of a business model is not a matter of concepts but of practice—continually narrowing the gap with the market.

I would like to introduce Business Model ZEN, a methodology for building business models developed through research based on a range of prior studies and my own experience. First, the name requires a brief explanation. ZEN signifies unity, harmony, and minimalism in an Eastern sense. These are the qualities this methodology seeks to embody. When choosing the name, I considered Tao and Zen, both familiar to the public. I ultimately chose Zen because the term, referring to the Japanese tradition, was found to evoke an image closer to minimalism. <remainder omitted>

(Read the Full DBR Article) Business Models: An Integrated, Multidimensional, Customer-Centric Approach