Derek Hagen, CFA, CFP®, FBS®, CFT™
“Once you label me, you negate me.”
-Soren Kirkegaard
If you’re anything like me, you’ve definitely had the experience where someone brings up an issue you know exactly how to fix.
Maybe you’re at a family gathering, and your cousin proudly tells you that they finally diversified their portfolio—by buying ten different S&P 500 index funds. In that moment, you know exactly what information they need.
And if you’re like me, you probably offered that advice. And… they didn’t take it.
You’ve likely also been on the receiving end of this. Maybe you told a friend about a trip you were planning, and instead of listening to your reasons for going, they launched into all the things you should do while you’re there—or worse, told you to go somewhere else entirely.
That dynamic—offering solutions before the other person is ready—is what’s known as the righting reflex (or the fixing reflex). It’s the automatic urge to correct or guide someone toward what we think is right.
We’ve all experienced how frustrating it can be: as the one offering advice that gets ignored, or as the one who feels unseen and unheard when advice arrives too soon.
Resisting the righting reflex isn’t easy—especially for those of us wired to help—but it’s essential if we want to build trust, uncover motivation, and help clients connect to their values.
Jumping In Too Soon
Clients aren’t always ready to take our advice—even if they say they want it.
Before a client can implement a recommendation, three things need to line up:
- They need to believe it’s important.
- They need to feel ready to take action.
- They need to have confidence in their ability to do it.
These elements of readiness tend to build over time, especially when we create space for exploration.
Contrast that with our natural desire to help. Most of us got into this field because we genuinely care about people and enjoy offering solutions. That desire to help starts high and tends to stay high—at least at first.
But when our good advice goes unimplemented, our energy can dip. It’s deflating to keep offering well-intentioned guidance that doesn’t stick.
Offering advice too early—before clients are ready—creates a gap between our desire to help and their readiness to act. That’s the righting reflex gap.
Sometimes, this doesn’t just result in inaction—it creates resistance. Clients may dig in, delay action, or reject the suggestion entirely.
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Time It Right
So how do we know when clients are ready? One useful tool is the scaling question—a staple in motivational interviewing.
Ask clients to rate something on a scale from 1 to 10:
- “How important is this to you?”
- “How ready do you feel?”
- “How confident are you that you can follow through?”
The actual number isn’t the point.
The real insight comes from the follow-up question.
Here’s where we need to resist another reflex—the urge to ask why they didn’t rate it higher.
- If they say 9, it’s tempting to ask, “Why not 10?”
- If they say 4, it’s tempting to ask, “Why so low?”
But both of those questions invite reasons against taking action. They get clients to explain their doubts, fears, and roadblocks—reinforcing ambivalence instead of motivation.
Instead, ask:
- “Why died you choose 6 and not 4?”
- “What got you to a 3 instead of a 1?”
- “What’s keeping it from being a 2?”
These questions invite clients to talk about their motivation—what matters to them and why they might take the next step.
The righting reflex is natural. We’ve been in this field a long time. We’ve studied hard. We know what works. Sometimes we see the solution immediately.
But if we deliver advice before the client is ready to hear it, they won’t take it.
As Carl Richards says, “Clients don’t care about your solution. They care about their problem.”
When we resist the reflex to fix and instead listen, explore, and wait for readiness, our advice lands with far more power—and far greater likelihood of follow-through.
Want to Learn More?
Money Quotient trains financial professionals in the True Wealth Process and helps them implement the concepts into their practices. The first step is to learn about the Fundamentals of True Wealth Planning.
References and Influences
Miller, William: Listening Well
Miller, William: On Second Thought
Miller, William & Stephen Rollnick: Motivational Interviewing