ompany culture is one of the hot-button issues in C-suites today, and for good reason. Providing an exceptional customer experience is directly dependent on culture. Success relies on employees to make judgment calls and creatively apply their understanding of customer needs far beyond what any rulebook could cover. Traditional customer service training and best practices will get you started, but, beyond those, you need to build and model a top-down culture of customer service.

The essence of building a strong customer service culture is simple and straightforward, as long as you don't distract yourself with superficialities — the mountain bikes and ping-pong tables, the beer taps in the breakroom, the endless jargon about "de-siloing" and the like. It is, in fact, relatively easy to understand and to get a start on implementing. It just takes interest, a drive to succeed, and a little of what's (ironically) called common sense.

Related: 10 Examples of Companies With Fantastic Cultures

Here are three steps leaders can take toward establishing and sustaining a culture of customer service:

1. Define your culture's purpose in a sentence or two.

Write a sentence or two that defines the purpose of your business and describes the type of behaviors you expect from every associate, manager and executive in your organization — and make sure they understand it. The definition of purpose should be direct, clear and free from the "consultant-ese" and jargon. As an example, one of the most powerful definitions of purpose that I know of is the one that guides the Mayo Clinic:

The needs of the patient come first.

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