As smart technology develops at an ever-increasing pace,firms are investing heavily in boosting the smartness of their service systems.To support these endeavors, practitioners and researchers call for guidance on how to account for customers'complex needs andwants when making smartness decisions. This research adopts thefirm's perspective on investigating how and why decisions onsmartness are undertaken. It examines howfirmsconfigure the smartnessof service systems and communicate the intended value tocustomers throughvalue propositions. Critically, it further unravels whyfirms make these decisions on the basis of their reasoningabout aligning resources to create value for customers & mdash;that is, thefirm'svalue creation logic. Our analysis of multiple case studiesacross several industry sectors reveals a number of pathways to service system smartness. These are labeled cautious, tailored,premium, and balanced pathways, and each entails specific combinations of smartness configurations and customer value propositions, underpinned by particular logics. A more nuanced analysis shows thatfirms may pursue multiple pathways simultaneously whentargeting different customer segments and indicates howfirms' characteristics may shape their pathways to smartness. The resultingframework can operate as a guiding tool for managers and consultants when making important smartness decisions.