Last weekend, Reader, my family and a few friends went to an event featuring Phil Rosenthal, of Netflix's "Somebody Feed Phil" fame.

Now, if you're not familiar with Phil, he's a sitcom writer turned world traveler/eater. He's built a following by inspiring even nervous travelers to get out and experience the world's people through what they eat. 🌎

So for sure, Phil talked a lot about travel and food. But I expected that.

What I didn't expect was to learn new ways to be nice. 😊

That sounds weird, right? After all, I hope I AM nice --at least most of the time. 👺

But in a world when it'd be easy for a TV star to show up distant and reserved, Phil charmed the audience—and me—by pulling out new levels of niceness that I rarely see.

Here are a few things Phil did skillfully that we can all learn from.

1. He took pressure off the host.

The night's moderator was a local food & wine writer whom Phil likely only met an hour or so backstage before the show. Her job was to "interview" him, but pro that he was, he kept the conversation flowing and prompted good questions, without making it seem like she wasn't doing her job.

📝 Lesson: When you're well prepared in advance for the moment, it takes pressure off the person who, on paper, is "in charge" (like your boss during your performance review or your team during a complex meeting.)

2. He got people involved.

When the host gave him a box of locally-made chocolates, he ate two immediately (who wouldn't?).

Then, he bounced downstage to share the box with those in the first row. If there'd been stairs to the stage, I'm sure he would have been passing those chocolates out until the box was empty.

📝 Lesson: We spend so much time on screens, that even in person, people default to being watchers. Inviting them to be involved wakes them up and connects them to whatever's going on. You don't have to offer chocolates, but maybe it's time to make fewer statements and ask more questions —and then be quiet and listen to the answers.

3. He took risks--and trusted it'd be okay.

I give Phil credit for including a live Q&A segment, where audience members could line up and ask anything. Few celebs do this anymore---who knows what will pop up?

But the risk turned out to be a big part of the fun.

Some questions were predictable: "What was the strangest thing you ever ate?" etc. But a few q's were rambly, practically incoherent stories that wound round and round and still didn't quite achieve a point. 🔃

My favorite was the guy who grew up on the block where Phil was born. After spouting a lot of obscure New Jersey references, Phil quipped, " I'm sure this is fascinating to these people." Ultimately, the man didn't have a question (!) but just wanted to be acknowledged and heard.

And Phil did (even though the rest of us were rolling our eyes.) 👀

📝 Lesson: Putting yourself in a position of unknowns is always a career ​risk. And sometimes it backfires. Our discomfort is worth it, though, when it helps others feel seen, heard, and more connected to the human that is you.

4. He remembered names.

Even when the questions were long and winding, Phil responded using the person's name.

For example, the meandering Jersey guy above shared the irrelevant detail that he was a retired dentist--and about 1000 words later, Phil said, "Thank you, Dr. [NAME]" (he remembered; I don't. 🤯)

📝 Lesson: Science shows our name is like music to us, signalling the brain to pay attention. I work on this skill every time I coach or speak to ​a big team and inevitably, someone's shocked when I call them by name. It's not a magic trick—we can train ourselves to pay attention and use names more often.

So how about you, Reader? 😇

Who's out there that you see harnessing the power of "nice"? Where are you using niceness to help ease your way through our wild world of work? Hit REPLY and tell me your story--I always want to hear from you, whatever you want to share (always confidential, too).

If you haven't been feeling so nice lately, maybe it's time to experiment with what a dash of extra niceness might do to your outlook or to others in your life. I mean, there are certainly plenty of sour people in the world, so why not have some of what Phil's having?

You're so nice to be here—I'm grateful to you for reading, sharing these notes with others, and wearing your red cape each day. Let's soar!

Always, Darcy

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P.S. Thanks for all the great response to the Reboot Your Year audio program! It's my honor to send this 28-day series of short (under 5 min) podcasts to you, free. If you're new here or you missed it, start here now. --D