Magic in the Room #21: The Bounds of Service

July 14, 2020

In this episode, Hannah, Chris and Luke explore the question “what is service?” and outline the three elements of an exceptional service experience. Stay tuned to the end for a special bonus: personal experiences with brands providing the best, and not-so-great service experiences!

 


Chris believes that there are three primary components to establishing excellent service that can be identified by asking the following questions:

 

  1. What type of relational meaning or connectedness are we getting out of the exchange?
  2. What level of responsiveness is a person receiving as part of an exchange?
  3. What are the perceptions of quality? Are they experiencing as part of that exchange?

 

It shouldn’t matter if you are making a transaction for an ice cream cone or buying a gigabyte of storage space in a data warehouse somewhere. Chris advises that what we’re transacting is immaterial. It is his experience throughout that transaction. Chris also shares how his business goal is the consumer, whoever we’re transacting with delivering a higher level of loyalty and affinity. This is due to the relational meaning that we’re providing them the how responsive we are in not just during the trade transaction but also post-transaction.

 

Beyond that, what impressions of quality are we leaving with them? Primarily, these three components determine how much affinity you develop for your brand too. Whether that is your personal brand, as a leader, or an enterprise that you lead, these are the three things that establish the loyalty towards that. But what else could you do this week to provide exceptional service in your B2B or B2C environment?

 

For Hannah, it will always be responsiveness. Although her strength is on the relational meaning and the perception, she admits that the responsiveness is where she often struggles. Having a large amount of stuff that requires a meaningful response can be incredibly time-consuming. But Hannah is exploring ways to simplify her work process and become more effective.

 

Luke is quick to recognize that the area he would like to improve is the relational connection piece. He admits that he can be slow to connect with people or at least come across that way. But, once he’s connected and built mutual trust, it goes deep. Luke shares his journey of understanding how he can express care for people, even if he has known them for five minutes.

 

When any consumer is looking for support, they typically ask themselves the following three questions. Do I trust this person? Can they help me? And do they care about me? Chris believes that if he can genuinely say yes to all three of these things, it will build a fundamental connection that solves a lot of service issues, or at the least, it lays the groundwork for service to exist.

 

What are you going to take away to provide exceptional service, time responsiveness, and a relational connection with your customers? What will you be doing differently to make people feel like you add value? How do you define CX and EX?

 

Please share your insights by commenting below.

 

 

 

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In this episode of Magic in the Room, Luke and Hannah explore the concept of polarities. Tensions like purpose and performance, stability and change, or accountability and grace that are often mistaken for problems to solve rather than dynamics to manage. Drawing on insights from Barry Johnson’s work, they explain how these opposing forces are interdependent and must be balanced over time to achieve sustained success. Through practical examples and personal reflections, they show how over-relying on one side of a polarity leads to predictable “shadow sides” such as stagnation, chaos, inefficiency, or burnout, while effective leadership requires recognizing where you are on the cycle and intentionally recalibrating. The episode emphasizes that many recurring organizational frustrations are not failures, but signals of imbalance, and offers a more nuanced approach to leadership. One that replaces rigid either/or thinking with flexible both/and awareness to improve decision-making, team dynamics, and long-term performance.

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By Sarah Whitfield • April 7, 2026
In this episode of Magic in the Room, Luke Freeman, Hannah Bratterud, and Chris Province dive into the concept of “mattering,” inspired by Zach Mercurio’s work, and explore why it is a foundational driver of engagement, performance, and culture in organizations. They challenge leaders to move beyond assuming people matter to actively ensuring individuals feel that they matter by being valued and by contributing value to a shared purpose. The conversation highlights how mattering differs from belonging, why it cannot be replaced by perks or efficiency, and how leadership behaviors like attention, recognition, and presence directly shape whether people feel seen, heard, and understood. Through examples ranging from workplace dynamics to broader societal trends like social disconnection, they argue that disengagement, conflict, and even poor performance are symptoms of a mattering deficit. Ultimately, they position mattering not as a soft concept, but as a measurable, actionable leadership responsibility that underpins trust, resilience, and long-term success.
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