An agent, in the film-world sense, traditionally gets a cut of all your work while you are contracted with that agent, and -- crucially -- gets it from you. There is a contract, you're going to gross $X, you owe agent 0.1 x $X.
"All your work" because otherwise it would be too easy to make a deal with the producer, and cut out the agent. The risk on the other side is that the agent might not actually do anything to earn the 10%. You usually don't end up keeping your first agent if you are successful.
A recruiting agency gets paid on a totally different model, usually a multiplier of the recruited person's salary, sometimes tied to them staying with the company a certain amount of time. The recruiter's business relationship is with the hiring company; the agent's is with you.
So for example, for a $100,000 per year regular job, the company might pay the recruiter $30,000 after hiring you, possibly subject to your not quitting or being fired in the first three months. They are only very loosely incentivized to get you a better deal, if at all: maybe the company offers them a fixed fee, maybe they can fill the position with someone else, etc. So in a way it's closer to the moral hazard of real-estate agents.
A "proper agent" the way I'm thinking of it, for a $100,000 gig they are going to get $10,000, and if they can get you a $300,000 gig they will get $30,000. But their contract is with you -- and they get their 10% of your gross from every check, if the gig goes longer they get more money.
The incentives are quite different. In an ideal world, I would have an agent find me my jobs and negotiate my rate, because they are going to fight to get 10% of a bigger number, and me being happy and thus working more actually makes them more money. Whereas for the recruiting agency, once they get their payout they have little interest in my further success.
An agent, in the film-world sense, traditionally gets a cut of all your work while you are contracted with that agent, and -- crucially -- gets it from you. There is a contract, you're going to gross $X, you owe agent 0.1 x $X.
"All your work" because otherwise it would be too easy to make a deal with the producer, and cut out the agent. The risk on the other side is that the agent might not actually do anything to earn the 10%. You usually don't end up keeping your first agent if you are successful.
A recruiting agency gets paid on a totally different model, usually a multiplier of the recruited person's salary, sometimes tied to them staying with the company a certain amount of time. The recruiter's business relationship is with the hiring company; the agent's is with you.
So for example, for a $100,000 per year regular job, the company might pay the recruiter $30,000 after hiring you, possibly subject to your not quitting or being fired in the first three months. They are only very loosely incentivized to get you a better deal, if at all: maybe the company offers them a fixed fee, maybe they can fill the position with someone else, etc. So in a way it's closer to the moral hazard of real-estate agents.
A "proper agent" the way I'm thinking of it, for a $100,000 gig they are going to get $10,000, and if they can get you a $300,000 gig they will get $30,000. But their contract is with you -- and they get their 10% of your gross from every check, if the gig goes longer they get more money.
The incentives are quite different. In an ideal world, I would have an agent find me my jobs and negotiate my rate, because they are going to fight to get 10% of a bigger number, and me being happy and thus working more actually makes them more money. Whereas for the recruiting agency, once they get their payout they have little interest in my further success.