By Ron Kaufman

We love receiving great customer service. That's no surprise.

But did you know that great service can actually elicit a physical reaction? A 2014 study by the American Express Service found that 63 percent of its 1,620 respondents said they felt an increased heart rate when they just thought about great service. And for 53 percent of those studied, great service caused them to have the same cerebral response that results from feeling loved.

The trick, of course is developing a customer service team that has the skills to provide such an overwhelming reaction. In today's service industries, service can be downright disappointing. We spend hours on hold when we just need an answer to a simple question. Store clerks seem angry with us when we tell them a mistake was made. And the list could go on and on.

If you want to combat this at your organization, you have to make providing great service a point of pride for employees. Service is taking action to create value for someone else—and when that is a driving force for staff members and your organization, everyone will be happier.

Here is how to strengthen your organization’s service teams:

1. Give them the leeway to make in-the-moment decisions. Improved service is unlikely to happen inside or outside of an organization without empowerment. Yet many leaders and employees seem to fear it. If a leader is not confident in employees, he or she doesn't want to empower them with greater authority or a larger budget. And if an employee is not confident in his or her abilities and decisions, he or she often does not want the responsibility of being empowered.

Don't overcomplicate service. Work with your employees to switch their focus from “What should I do?” to “Who am I serving and what do they value?” And then let them know you trust them to make the right decision so that they feel empowered to act.

If an employee feels a customer deserves a discount, then let that happen. You can monitor this system by reviewing situations with your team to ensure that in-the-moment decisions lead to the result everyone wants: happy and loyal customers, confident staff, and a successful organization.

2. Have mistake meetups. Another big part of empowerment is demystifying the fear that comes along with making a mistake. Have a meeting and say, 'We want learning from mistakes to be part of our culture. Have staff leaders kick off the meeting by saying, “I'll go first. Here's the biggest mistake I made last week. Here's what I learned from it. What can I learn from you?” Then, everyone shares in that way, and that makes everyone feel safer. It gives them the freedom to try new ideas and to take new actions.

3. Eradicate cumbersome policies and procedures. Here’s something that happened when I was dining at a luxury resort in California. The waiter explained that there was a special menu that night, spotlighting several of the chef's signature dishes. But my guests were vegetarians and had nothing to choose from on the menu, and I had been craving a particular salmon salad. So we asked to order from the regular menu. Obviously uncomfortable, the waiter whispered, "If you go back to your room and order room service, then you can order the salmon salad or anything else on the [room service] menu, but I can't serve you those choices here tonight."

In trying to spotlight the chef's menu, the restaurant had created a major roadblock for the people who worked there—the waiter wasn't given permission to serve! Front-line staff members are taught to follow policies and procedures and are hesitant to break the rules. Yet some rules should be broken, changed, or at least seriously bent from time to time.

4. Acknowledge achievements. Compliments are highly motivating and inspire employees to keep coming up with newer and better service ideas. That's why you should actively solicit feedback from customers and regularly share positive comments with employees. The great thing about acknowledging achievements is that you can get a big impact out of simple actions. For example, simply saying, "Thank you!" to an employee who handled a customer well or tweeting a message about the employee of the week can go a long way.

5. Educate and inspire employees to serve each other. When most organizations set out to fix their service issues, they start with customer-facing employees. Big mistake. The fact is, front-line service people cannot give better service when they themselves aren't being served internally.

6. Teach them to solicit customer feedback at various points of contact. Asking, "Is there anything we can do better for you the next time?" accomplishes two important objectives. First, you gather valuable ideas. Second, you get the customer thinking about doing repeat business.

Even if customers don't have a recommendation, trust that they'll be glad an employee cared enough to ask. When an employee engages a customer in this way, it's yet another way to say, “We value you. We want to provide you with the best possible service, and we would be delighted to serve you again.” It also shows your customers that you aren't afraid of improvement. It shows just how dedicated you are to delivering on your promise of uplifting service.

7. Help them find ways to up service. Imagine you are going up a ski lift and accidentally drop one of your gloves or ski poles into the woods below. At Deer Valley Ski Resort in Utah, the staff help you find the missing item and then give you a coupon for a free hot chocolate.

There are some great examples of organizations going the extra mile for their customers, and it's important that employees are encouraged to develop this kind of thinking. In a staff meeting, review a few customer service recovery interactions, even those that went well. Then, have staff brainstorm ways the recovery could have been improved.

8. Train employees to tell residents what they will do. When there is a mistake or mishap, explain what steps will be taken and when staff will get back in touch with the results. Thank them for giving your local government the opportunity to set things right.

Of course, the first step when a mistake has been made, or even just when a customer perceives that a mistake was made, is to apologize. Once an apology has been made, provide any useful information you can about what will happen next. Ask them if they have any questions and answer them to the best of your ability. If you don't have an answer, let them know what steps you're going to take to find it.

Employees should also show that they are sincere about their commitment to do well in the areas the customer values. At the very least, you can say, 'I'm going to make sure everyone in the organization’s department hears your story. We don't want this to happen again. When the desire to improve is expressed, you start on the path to rebuilding credibility with the customer.

9. Encourage them to develop their own signature service touch. Sometimes small service touches can have a big impact. Here's a fundamental truth of service: Small changes can lead to big leaps in customer perception—and they don't have to be costly at all.

Air Mauritius, for example, had captains to start greeting passengers as they board the plane. This small gesture creates a huge impression of welcome and respect for passengers. It also asked captains to provide memorable information as they fly over certain areas—like descriptions of cities, landmarks, volcanoes, and so forth. This literally turned flights into uniquely guided tours. Passengers loved these changes.

10. Provide a weekly service thought. Post or e-mail a message about the importance of service or how to improve service each week. It can be as simple as an inspiring quote or a link to an article with an example of great service.

11. Emphasize service with new hires. An organization’s orientation program can be far from uplifting. Often they are little more than robotic introductions: This is your desk; this is your password; those are your colleagues; these are the tools, systems, and processes used; and if you have any questions, ask. Welcome to the organization. Now get to work. These basic introductions and inductions are important, but they don't connect new employees to the organization or the service culture in a welcoming and motivating way.

Developing service-minded, service-driven employees will be worth every ounce of energy that’s put into it. When steps are taken to build a strong service team, everyone is fully engaged, encouraging each other, improving the customer experience, and making the local government organization more successful.