A system for managing values associated with properties of elements within a process model can include a storage element for storing the process model and a processing element. The processing element can be configured to identify within the process model an element, to identify an object containing the element, to assign a value for a property of the element, and to retrieve the value for the property of element. The value for property of the element can be stored in location selected from one among an element modifier applied to the element, an object modifier applied to the object, a default set of values for the object, and a default set of values for the element, where the location for storing the value of the property of the element is selected such that the location has a higher relative priority than a location for storing a previous value for the property of the element.