1. Who we are
The Values Institute is run by Dash Media Limited, 242a Oceanbeach Road, Mount Maunganui, Bay of Plenty 3116, New Zealand. We are a small team, and we handle your information under the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020. If you have any question or request about your information, email hello@values.institute. That address reaches our privacy officer.
This policy covers the Values Institute website, the Values App at app.values.institute, and everything we offer through them: the assessment, guides, coaching, teams, courses, and community.
2. What we collect
To create an account: your first name and email address. Without these we can't save your results or send them to you.
As you use the service: your assessment responses, including the values you select and how you rank them; your well-being and check-in ratings; any written answers, reflections, or coursework you choose to give us; and records of anything you buy.
Optional: gender, age range, country, life stage, and relationship status. You can leave any of these blank and nothing is withheld from you if you do.
Automatically: usage data such as your IP address, browser and device type, pages visited, and the site that sent you here. When you complete the assessment we also keep your browser's language setting, the country your connection comes from, and a shortened, one-way code made from your IP address, which we use to spot misuse.
About other people: if you invite someone to compare values, you can enter their first name so the invitation can show it. That is all we collect about them from you. If you buy Premium as a gift, we use the recipient's name and email only to deliver it.
Payments are handled by Stripe. Your card details go straight to Stripe and never touch our systems. We keep a record of what you bought, when, for how much, and Stripe's reference numbers.
3. How we use it
We use your information to run the service and give you your results and guides; to support you; to process purchases; to send you your results, a short welcome series, and occasional updates, which you can stop with one click in any email; to understand how the service is used so we can improve it; to produce the statistics, reports, and research described in section 4; to keep the service secure; and to meet our legal obligations.
If you're in the EU, EEA, or UK, we send the welcome series and updates only if you asked for them, by ticking the box when you signed up or switching them on in your account. Emails that are part of the service, such as the code you use to sign in and receipts for purchases, go to everyone.
We don't use your information to make automated decisions that have legal or similarly significant effects on you.
4. Statistics, reports, and research
The Values Institute studies human values, and your responses help us do that. We use everyone's responses, in de-identified form, to produce statistics and reports such as the Global Values Report, and we may share de-identified data with researchers and research partners who have agreed in writing not to try to identify anyone and not to pass the data on. We don't sell research data. This covers every response we hold.
De-identified means your name, email address, account details, and written answers are never included. Where a group is so small that a person might be recognized, we combine it with others or leave it out. Published results never describe an individual.
If you'd rather not be included, you can opt out at any time on your account page at app.values.institute/account, or by emailing us. From then on your responses are left out of everything we produce. Opting out changes nothing about your access to the service.
5. Sharing you choose
Your results are private by default. Nothing below happens until you take the step described.
- Compare. You can create a compare link and send it to someone yourself; we never send it for you. When they accept it, or complete the assessment through it, you each see a shared profile built from both sets of values. Each link works once, so treat it as private until then. Either of you can end the comparison from your comparisons page.
- Coaching. If you work with a coach who uses the Values App, you can choose to let them see your results. Until you agree, your coach sees nothing. If you agree, your coach sees your first name, email address, top five values, archetype, and the date you completed the assessment. To switch this off, email us and we'll do it straight away. Your coach is independent of us and responsible for how they treat what they've seen; we ask them to keep it confidential.
- Teams. If you join a team, your team lead can see that you've joined and completed the assessment, and receives a combined report once at least four members have completed it. Your individual results are never shown to your team lead or to other members.
- Share cards. You can create an image of your values to post or send. We don't post anything on your behalf.
- Reviews, certificates, and the coach directory. Reviews we approve appear on our website with the name you chose. If you complete the Values Coach Certification, your name, certificate number, and certification date are public on your certificate page and in the coach directory, so clients can verify you. Anything more in the directory is what you add to your coach profile yourself, and you can take your listing down from that page at any time.
6. Who else sees your information
We never sell your personal information, and we never give identifying information to advertisers or data brokers.
We use a small number of providers to run the service. They act on our instructions and are bound to protect your information: Vercel (hosting), Supabase (database and sign-in), Stripe (payments), Twilio SendGrid (service emails), MailerLite (newsletter and welcome emails), Anthropic (the AI that writes your values story, readings, and plans from your first name, values, ratings, and the optional written answers you gave; never your email address, and not used to train their models), Bunny.net and YouTube (course and site video), and GitHub (where scholarship applications from the website are stored).
Most of these providers are in the United States, and some processing happens in the European Union and on content-delivery servers around the world. Where a provider only holds information for us, it stays under our control and this policy still applies. Where we pass personal information to someone outside New Zealand for their own use, such as a researcher, we first make sure they will protect it to a standard comparable to New Zealand law.
We may also disclose information where the law requires it, to protect someone's safety, to prevent fraud or misuse, or to defend our legal rights. If the Values Institute is ever sold or merged, your information may transfer with it, and where we can, we'll tell you first.
7. Who at the Values Institute reads what you write
Your assessment answers and the notes you keep in the app are not read by anyone unless you ask for support that needs it. Certification coursework and coach reflections are read by Brad Hook as part of running the certification. Reflections you write inside Premium courses are yours; they are not read.
8. How long we keep it
We keep your account and results while you have an account. You can delete your account from your account page at any time: your name, email address, readings, comparisons, written answers, and optional details are removed immediately, your values and ratings are kept only in de-identified form, and you are taken off our mailing list. If you have coursework, notes, or practices in the app that you also want gone, tell us and we'll remove them. Purchase records are kept for seven years because New Zealand tax law requires it. De-identified data already used in statistics or research stays, because it can no longer be linked to you. Our providers hold backups and logs for short periods on their own schedules.
9. Security and breaches
We encrypt your information in transit, store it with providers that encrypt it at rest, and limit access to the people who need it. No system is perfectly secure, so we can't promise absolute security. If a breach happens that is likely to cause serious harm, we'll notify the Privacy Commissioner and the people affected as soon as we practically can, as the law requires.
10. Cookies
The Values App sets one cookie, which keeps you signed in. Your browser also stores unfinished work, such as an assessment you've started, on your device; that isn't sent to us until you finish. Our website uses Vercel Web Analytics, which counts visits without cookies and without identifying you. Stripe, Bunny.net, and YouTube set their own cookies when you use their parts of the service. Service emails record whether they were opened; newsletters also record which links were clicked.
11. Your rights
You can ask us at any time what personal information we hold about you and ask us to correct it. We'll reply within 20 working days and may need to check it's you first. You can also opt out of research (section 4), withdraw sharing you've set up (section 5), delete your account (section 8), ask for a copy of your information, or unsubscribe from emails using the link in any email or the switch on your account page. All of this is free: email hello@values.institute.
If you're unhappy with how we've handled your information, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz.
If you're in the EU, EEA, or UK: we process your information to provide the service you've asked for, for our legitimate interest in improving the service and studying values with de-identified data, with your consent where you share results with others or ask for our welcome series and updates, and to meet legal obligations. You also have the rights to erasure, restriction, portability, objection, and to withdraw consent, and you can complain to your local data-protection authority. New Zealand holds an EU adequacy decision.
12. Children
The service is for people aged 16 and over, and you confirm this when you sign up. We don't knowingly collect information from anyone under 16. If you believe a child under 16 has given us information, email us and we'll delete it.
13. Changes
We'll post any changes here and update the date at the top. If a change materially affects how we use your information, we'll email everyone with an account to say so.
14. Contact
hello@values.institute, or Dash Media Limited, 242a Oceanbeach Road, Mount Maunganui, Bay of Plenty 3116, New Zealand. This policy is governed by New Zealand law.