Adapting to the Person in Front of You

Imagine a florist named Rhiannon Teague who meets Mr. Halloran about his wife’s 70th birthday dinner. He opens the door and starts before she has her coat off. “Forty people, in the dining room, the 14th of June. She loves peonies. What do you need from me?” He says it in one breath and looks at her.

Rhiannon likes to begin a job slowly. She asks about the room, and when he says it is the dining room, she asks about the light in it. She tells him how she plans a table, starting with the cloth and the candles and working up to the flowers. She asks what his wife wore to their wedding. Mr. Halloran answers each question in a few words and looks at his watch twice. After 20 minutes, he says he will be in touch. He hires the florist his assistant found, who sent two options and a price the same afternoon.

Suppose instead that Rhiannon hears the one breath and answers in the same breath. “Peonies in June, 40 people. One long table, or several?” He says one. “Then I’ll send you two options and a price by Thursday. Two questions. What color is the room, and does she like scent?” He answers both in ten words. The meeting takes six minutes, and he books her on Thursday from his phone.

Rhiannon knew the same amount about peonies both times, and she would have charged the same price. What changed was speed. Mr. Halloran got to the job in his first sentence, said what he wanted outright, and gave her four facts. The first Rhiannon made him wait, work his way through her questions, and listen to her method. The second Rhiannon moved at his speed, and to him the meeting felt like talking with someone who understood him. The week after, she meets a client who takes ten minutes to get to the flowers. The right speed for that client is slow. Here is why matching a client’s speed works, and what to listen for in the first few minutes.

People drift toward each other’s speed, and like each other better for it

In 1984, Richard Street of Texas Tech University published a study in the journal Human Communication Research. Forty students in a class on interviewing each sat down with a business person or a professional. Each student chose someone in a field that interested them. The interviews ran 20 to 30 minutes. Street measured, minute by minute, how fast each person talked and how quickly each one answered when the other stopped.

Both sides drifted. The interviewers moved toward the speed of the professionals, and the professionals moved toward the speed of the students. Where the two drifted closer, there was some evidence that each thought the other more capable and easier to like.

A news report in Nature in 2003 summed up two later studies of mimicry in one headline, “Copycat waitresses get bigger tips.” Diners who were mimicked, the report says, were more generous to the staff.

Those were interviews and restaurants, and the step to a client’s front hall is the course’s own. Here is the step. The drift in Street’s interviews happened on its own, with nobody deciding to drift. A florist who keeps to her own speed with a brisk client has stopped the drift. The client is left to do all of the adjusting, waiting through her questions, and the waiting is what he feels. A florist who moves at his speed asks nothing of him. He feels at ease, and he puts the ease down to the florist.

Three signs to listen for in the first few minutes

Each of the three signs is something the client does, and the three are the course’s own. Here is each one.

Pace is how fast the client moves toward the work. Mr. Halloran got there in his first sentence. Other clients take ten minutes, by way of the house, the family, and the last florist. The sign is where the client is after two minutes: at the job, or still in the story.

Directness is whether the client says what they want or lets you work it out. “No roses” is direct. “My mother always had roses,” said with a look, is a hint. A client who speaks outright wants your opinions outright. A client who hints has handed you something to ask about.

Detail is how much the client gives you, and it is a fair guide to how much they want back. Mr. Halloran gave four facts, so he wanted facts. A client who tells you the history of the house wants to hear how you would work in it.

You can hear all three before you have said much, because in a first meeting the client talks first. Your opener is a question about them, and the subject stays with them for as long as they want it. So the first few minutes are the client’s. What they do with those minutes shows you their pace, their directness, and their detail. None of the three is whether the client wants you formal or casual. A client can call you Ms. Teague and get to the point in one sentence.

A travel advisers’ blog watches the same signs, and sorts clients into four types

Joshua Harrell writes for travel advisers on the WorldVia Travel Network blog. In April 2026, he published a post on how to communicate with each kind of client. His first instruction is to look at the length of a client’s messages. “Short, punchy communicators want short, punchy responses,” he writes. “Long, detailed writers usually want detail back.”

Then he sorts clients into four types and gives each a name. With one type, you “lead with the answer, then offer the reasoning only if they ask.” With another, “long emails are a feature, not a bug.” A third type wants you to “reflect their language back to them,” and a fourth wants you to “make confident recommendations without asking for sign-off on every choice.”

Measured against this lesson, the first instruction is the whole method, and the four names are where the lesson parts from him. The length of a message is the detail sign, and he is right that it tells you what to send back. The names are a problem, because they ask you to decide what kind of person the client is. Then they ask you to treat the client as that kind. A person who writes two brisk sentences from a phone on Tuesday can settle into a chair on Thursday. Then they tell you about the garden. What the client does in front of you is the sign to match. So take the sign, and leave the names.

A tutor slows down for a mother who starts the story at the beginning

Imagine a tutor named Ambrose Keane who meets Mrs. Pelletier about her son, Theo, who is 12. Her message said that Theo “needs some help with math.” At the door, Ambrose asks what kind of help. Mrs. Pelletier starts with the school Theo left in September. Then she tells him about the school before that, the teacher who liked Theo, and the test in October that went badly. After eight minutes she has not said what the help is.

Ambrose had Mr. Halloran’s kind of client last week, and he can feel the schedule in his bag. He leaves it there. He asks one question about the October test. Mrs. Pelletier tells him about it. Then she asks how he works with a boy who has stopped trying. Ambrose answers that in full, because she asked. She asks how long a session is, and he tells her. She asks whether he has taught a boy who changed schools, and he tells her about one. After 40 minutes she books a term, and she tells her husband that the tutor “actually listened.”

Mrs. Pelletier’s pace was slow, what she wanted came out as a story, and she gave Ambrose everything. He matched all three. He let the story run, and he asked about the part of it that mattered. He answered her questions at the length she asked them. The schedule came out at the end, in two minutes, when she asked for it.

What matching changes, and what stays the same

Matching a client changes your speed, your bluntness, and the amount you say. It does not change your answers, your price, or your opinions. Here is the line for each of the three.

The pace you match is the client’s pace through the meeting. It is how soon they want the work, and how long they stay in the story. The slower pace you put on a single answer stays at either speed. It is the pace of a sentence, not of a meeting. Rhiannon’s “Peonies in June, 40 people” was said at that pace. It was said sooner, that is all.

The directness you match is in how you give an opinion, not in whether you give it. With a client who speaks outright, say yours outright. “I’d keep the flowers low, so people can talk across the table.” With a client who hints, ask what the hint means before you act on it. “You said the dining room is not really a flowers room. Would you rather keep the table bare, or is that a reason to keep the flowers low?” Then give the same opinion, with its reason. The yes, the date, and the opinion with its reason are the same at either level.

The detail you match is how much you say before the client’s next question. With a client who gave you three facts, give the answer and the one fact they need, and stop. With a client who gave you the history, answer each of their questions in full, because they are asking. What you do not do at either level is add what the client did not ask for.

Why sorting clients into types goes wrong

Imagine an event planner named Tobias Weir who has read a book that sorts clients into four kinds. A new client, Mrs. Fenwick, writes two sentences. “We need a planner for my husband’s 60th in September, about 80 people. Can you come Tuesday at 4?” Tobias writes her name on a page with the book’s word for a brisk client next to it. He arrives on Tuesday with a one-page plan and the numbers ready.

Mrs. Fenwick takes him into the garden before they sit down. She starts with the summer they bought the house, and the party they gave the first year, when the marquee blew over. Tobias listens for a minute and then brings her back to the numbers. She goes on about the marquee. He brings her back again, and then a third time, with the one-page plan. She says she will think about it, and she hires the planner her friend used. She tells the friend that Tobias “didn’t seem interested in the house.”

The two sentences were a brisk person writing from her phone between two other things. The woman in the garden was the client, and the sign was in front of Tobias from the first minute. She had settled into a chair and started a story. The version that works has Tobias leave the plan in his bag for 20 minutes. He asks what happened after the marquee blew over. The label on his page told him to hurry a client who wanted to go slowly.

Matching a client is not putting on an act

Changing your speed and your bluntness to suit a client can feel like pretending to be someone else. It can also feel like a trick from a sales course.

What moves is the speed, the bluntness, and the amount, and what stays is you. Rhiannon said the same yes and the same price in both meetings, and she held the same opinion about the flowers. Harrell gives the same answer to his readers: adjust how you say it, “without changing your values or your expertise.” The drift in Street’s interviews happened without anyone deciding to drift, and the people who drifted closer thought better of each other. A professional who keeps one speed whoever is in the room is the one making an effort. The client can feel it.

How to match a client from their first few minutes

1. In your next first meeting, after your opener, say little for the first few minutes and listen for three signs. The first is how fast the client gets to the job. The second is whether they say what they want outright or hint at it. The third is how much they tell you.
2. Set your pace to theirs. A client who got to the job in a minute gets your answers in that minute. A client who took ten minutes to tell the story gets the story heard out, and then a question about it. For example, a private chef whose client says, “Four dinners a week, no shellfish, what does it cost?” answers with the price and the start date in two sentences.
3. Set your directness to theirs. With a client who said what they want outright, give your opinion outright, with its reason. With a client who hinted, ask what the hint means before you act on it. For example, a dog walker whose client says, “Biscuit can be a bit much with other dogs,” asks, “Has he had a fight, or does he pull toward them?” Then he says what he would do.
4. Set your detail to theirs. With a client who gave you three facts, give the answer and the one fact they need, and stop. With a client who gave you the history, answer each question they ask in full, and ask one back. For example, a home organizer whose client has described every cupboard in the kitchen answers her question about the pantry in full. Then she asks which cupboard the client opens first in the morning.
5. When the client changes pace partway through, change with them. The sign is in what they do. A client who looks at the clock wants the work now. A client who settles into a chair and starts a story wants to be heard.
6. Afterward, write the three on the client’s page in one sentence, as a note about this meeting and not a label. For example, “Got to the job in a minute, says it outright, wants facts.” Read it before the next meeting, and expect the client to be different on a different day.

Next: You will see how to ask a client questions without the meeting turning into an interrogation.