The Signs a Client Is Holding Back

Imagine a coach named Petra Vance who meets Mr. Garroway in his office in October. He started a software company 22 years ago and still runs it. The chair of his board, Margaret, suggested the meeting and gave him Petra’s name.

Mr. Garroway shakes her hand and sits back with his arms folded. Petra asks how the year has gone. “Fine,” he says. She explains how she works, with two sessions a month for six months. Partway through, he takes out his phone and reads his messages. She asks what he would most like to change at work. “Hard to say.” He looks out of the window while she talks.

Petra has another meeting at four, and she can feel this one slipping. So she talks faster. She describes the founders she has coached and what changed for them. She sets out the fee, $4,000 a month, and the first date she has free. Mr. Garroway says he will think about it. That evening he writes to Margaret that he does not need a coach.

Suppose instead that Petra notices the folded arms, the phone, and the one-word answers, and she stops halfway through her method. She puts her notes on the table. “Let me stop there,” she says. “Before I go on, what would you want to get out of this?”

Mr. Garroway is quiet for a moment. Then he puts the phone down. “I assume Margaret thinks I’m not up to the job.” Petra says, “What we work on is yours to choose, and nothing you tell me goes back to the board.” Then she asks what he would choose. He talks for 20 minutes about the person who will run the company after him. He books six months before she leaves.

Petra offered the same coaching at the same fee both times. What changed was what she did when she saw the signs. In the first version, she took them as a reason to sell harder, so she said more. In the second, she took them as a sign that something unsaid was in the way. So she stopped, slowed down, and asked.

A client who has decided to hire you usually shows it before they say yes. A client who is holding back also shows it, often before they say a word about it. Here is what it looks like, and how to find out what is underneath.

A Toronto broker saw the no at the table before anyone said it

David Fleming is a real estate broker in Toronto who writes the Toronto Realty Blog. In November 2017, he wrote about an offer he presented for two buyers, Andrew and Marion. It was the full asking price, $1,298,000, with no conditions. Two people owned the house, and only one came to the table. The seller who came “sat with arms-folded, in a cheap, ugly, kitchen chair.”

Fleming held out his hand and introduced himself, “to which all I received in return was ‘hi.’” He writes that “part of my job is to read body language and non-verbal cues.” When the seller looked at the first page of the offer, he saw her roll her tongue through her cheek. He also saw “a blank stare, a shift of the bodyweight from one side of the chair to the other.”

As the listing agent read the offer aloud, she sat “not looking at her copy of the offer and not following along, shifting her gaze from one end of the table to the other.” The agent asked whether the closing date suited her. “I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it,” she said.

The reason came out at the front door. Fleming told the listing agent that “she didn’t look me in the eye once.” The agent explained. “The husband stayed late at the office,” he said. “When he found out there was only one offer, he basically decided they weren’t going to sell the house tonight.”

Fleming did not go by one sign. Folded arms on their own could mean a cold kitchen. He saw folded arms, a one-word hello, eyes on everything but the offer, and short answers, all at once. Together they told him that something had been settled before he walked in. The reason sat underneath, with a man who was not at the table. Meanwhile the agent went on reading clauses nobody was listening to. Fleming could do nothing about it, because the seller was the other agent’s client. In your own meeting, the client is yours, and you can ask.

A business coach tells a designer to find out why her clients hesitate

Sean Low is a business coach for interior designers who answers designers’ letters in a column for Business of Home. In February 2021, a designer wrote to him about clients who had signed with her firm. She was showing them her designs room by room. “They are enthusiastic about the work but hesitant to execute all of it,” she wrote.

She had ruled out two reasons. “I’m truly not getting ‘I don’t like this’ vibes from these clients,” she wrote. “They also haven’t mentioned financial concerns, so I’m not sure what to make of their hesitation.”

Low’s answer was that the clients were afraid. They feared getting it wrong, living in rooms that were not them, and the designer missing the mark. Then he warned against the usual reply. “Telling them not to be scared is the surest way to make them stay scared,” he wrote. “The way most designers tell clients not to be scared is by saying, ‘Trust me.’” His advice was to ask. “Instead, try to find out why they are not confident in their decisions.”

The designer’s clients had already hired her, and the step to a first meeting is the course’s own. Here is the step. Something was in the way. The designer could tell that it was not dislike, and the clients had not mentioned money. A reassurance would have left it where it was. What is under the holding back is often a worry about choosing wrong that the client has not said. A question gives the client room to say it.

An Alabama travel adviser kept a client by hearing out his worry

In June 2025, Travel Weekly reported on a panel of travel advisers at a trade show in Orlando. Jana Elias, who owns a travel agency in Harvest, Alabama, told a story about a client in Australia. He had booked back-to-back cruises sailing from the United States, a month on ships. Then he got in touch to say that he was no longer comfortable coming to the country.

Elias called him and talked through his concerns. Together they found a different trip, and he switched it to Greece. “It’s important that we make sure that our clients feel heard and that we respect the concerns that they’re having, whatever those are,” she said. “So that was one where I was able to retain my client.”

Elias did not defend the cruises she had booked for him. She heard out what worried him first. Then the answer was a change to the trip, not a better case for the old one.

What holding back looks like in a meeting

A client who is holding back keeps some distance from you and from your plan. Look for a few signs together:

The client’s arms fold and stay folded, or they sit back from the table while you talk.
The client picks up their phone while you are talking and reads their messages.
The client’s answers shrink to a word or two, such as “Fine” or “Hard to say.”
The client looks at the window or the door, or anywhere but the plan between you.

The list is the course’s own, drawn from Fleming’s seller, and here is the reason. Each sign is a way of staying out of the conversation without saying so. One sign alone is a guess. A client who glances at the clock may only want you to get to the point. A client looking at the calendar on their phone in the quiet after your answer is thinking it over. A few signs together mean that something is in the way.

Notice when the signs began. That is the course’s suggestion, because a client who was at ease a minute ago was at ease until something changed. If the signs began at one part of your plan, the reason is likely in that part. If they were there when you sat down, the reason came in with the client, as it did with Fleming’s seller.

Once you see a few signs together, stop presenting and slow down. Ask one open question about what the client wants, and wait for the answer. Do not say what you saw. A sentence such as “You seem unsure” tells the client that their worry showed, so leave the worry unsaid and let the client name it. When they do, take it as a concern the two of you can look at, and answer that.

Why guessing the reason out loud goes wrong

Imagine a caterer named Bettina Sorel who meets Mr. and Mrs. Drummond about a party at their house. They have been married for 35 years, and 50 guests are coming in June. Mrs. Drummond booked the meeting. Bettina walks them through the menu and describes a grill station on the terrace, run by two of her chefs. The quote comes to $12,000.

Mr. Drummond folds his arms. He picks up his phone and scrolls through it. When Bettina asks whether he likes the menu, he says, “Fine.” She has a tasting at three, and she can see that something is wrong. She guesses that it is the price, and she says it out loud. “If the budget’s a worry, I can take the grill station off and bring it down to $9,000.”

“It’s not the money,” Mr. Drummond says. Mrs. Drummond looks at the table. The meeting ends a few minutes later. Two days after, Mrs. Drummond writes that they have decided to keep the party simple and do the food themselves.

Bettina saw the signs, and she was right that something was in the way. Her mistake was guessing the reason out loud and answering her guess with a lower price. The guess was wrong, and it told the Drummonds that their caterer thought money was their problem. Mr. Drummond has run the grill at every family party for 35 years. To him, two chefs at his grill mean being pushed out of his own party. In the version that works, Bettina notices that the signs began at the grill station, and she stops there. “Before I go on, how do you see the evening going?” Mr. Drummond says that he always does the grill. Bettina says, “Then the grill is yours, and we do everything around it.”

Stopping partway through is not losing the meeting

Stopping your presentation in the middle can feel like admitting that the meeting is going badly. It can also feel like giving up control of the meeting to a client who is not helping.

The client already knows how the meeting is going. At Fleming’s table, the agent read every clause while the seller looked from one end of the table to the other. Fleming writes that everyone at the table knew it was “merely an exercise.” Going on is what loses a meeting like that. Petra’s question took one sentence, and her method was still there when Mr. Garroway was ready to hear about it.

How to find out what a client is holding back

Before the meeting, write one open question about the client, and keep it at the top of your notes. It asks what they want, not what they think of your offer. For example, a photographer can write, “Before I go on, what would you want these photos to be for?”
In the meeting, keep an eye on the client while you talk. Look for a few signs together. The arms stay folded, the phone comes out, the answers shrink to a word, or the eyes go anywhere but the plan. Notice what you were saying when the signs began.
When you see a few together, finish your sentence and stop presenting. Put down whatever is in your hands. Say your question slowly, and then hold the quiet until the client answers.
Do not say what you saw, and do not guess the reason. For example, a florist can say, “Let me stop there. What matters most to you about the day?” She does not say, “You seem unsure,” or, “If it’s the price, I can do less.”
When the client says what is in the way, answer that with a fact or a change to the plan. Leave the rest of your presentation for later. For example, a dog walker whose client has never given anyone a key can say, “Then your housekeeper lets me in at noon, and I won’t need a key.”
If you see only one sign, carry on with your presentation and keep watching.

Next: You will hear what clients say when they are ready, and what their words tell you.