12/11/2025
11 Things Your Agent Won’t Tell You, But Wishes You Knew
NOV 12, 2025
by Mildred Yuan
Agents believe in their clients and want them to find success, says Mildred Yuan, but actors need to reciprocate that trust. Here are 11 things that she believes can help nurture a healthy working relationship…
Every agent has an unspoken list of things that they wish their clients understood. This column is a combination of repeated conversations
I’ve had over the years with colleagues, as well as responses I received from other agents at industry events in the past few weeks as I was conducting my research. Here are my top 11 tips.
1. Your “any news?” text always makes us sigh.
If we have news, we will be the first to tell you, as we are just as invested in you getting a job as you are.
Top tip: be intentional and supportive when you contact your agent. Do you have something that can help them pitch you? Are you working on projects or making contacts that might help to get you in the room?
2. Keep us up to date
Keep your headshots and showreels current and let us know how you are doing. Yes, it’s important always to put your best foot forward , but we all have those clients who ‘don’t want to be any trouble’ and ghost us. No information is sometimes worse than too much. We need ammunition in order to be able to put you forward for the right jobs, and for you to get them.
3. Think before you fire us
When you fire us as soon as we get you that big job because you ‘need someone to get you to the next level’ it is absolutely gutting and dismisses all of the hard work that we have invested in you from the beginning. All the time spent curating your CV, headshots and showreels, and perfecting the pitch and your public presence will be sunk cost that we won’t ever get back. If you do feel you need to move on, at least acknowledge the work that your current agent has put in and thank them for
their efforts.
4. We work for you, not your partner
We hate it when your husband/wife/partner gets involved with trying to manage your career, even if they happen to be in the industry and have relevant expertise. Keep those boundaries clear. You are very welcome to ask your spouse for advice, but do not muddy the waters and allow them to call us and chase money, or make suggestions on how we can be doing our job better.
5. We can help with the map, not the destination
It’s not our job to construct a strategy for you, it’s yours. We can advise you on how to get where you want to go, but you need to know your destination and be motivated to walk down that road.
Coming to us and saying that we need to make a strategy without an endpoint in mind and having done no research or work on your own shows a lack of self-awareness and staying power.
Top tip: It’s always easiest for us if you have your own momentum and plan, and offer us ‘veto’ power or some options on the way forward. It’s far easier for us to comment on something you have created, rather than come up with something new from scratch that you might not even want. You can also hire a career coach to talk about constructing a strategy and options, but even in those sessions you need to come with some sort of idea of what you want
to achieve.
6. We are not magicians
There isn’t a magic formula to suddenly getting you in the room and we don’t have magic wands. Be prepared to run experiments and test things out (headshots, showreel, pitches) for an extended amount of time (at least six months). Changing tack every other day is going to confuse us, the industry and yourself.
7. Avoid unhealthy comparisons
Telling us “my friend is in x project” and assuming that you should automatically also have an audition is a toxic trait, especially if your friend is a different gender, casting type or has a different skillset or CV to you.
Top tip: do your own research on the project and what it is looking for and provide some ammunition (credits, reel, anecdotal evidence) before contacting your agent to ask them to pitch you. I would advise not mentioning the friend at all.
8. What kind of support do you need right now?
We are not qualified therapists and it is unfair to trauma-dump on us all of your dissatisfactions about the industry and your career. Please make sure your emotional needs are met before you approach your agent about an issue and make sure that it is work-related and you have already brainstormed some solutions.
Top tip: if you need support, it is as important to find the right therapists and coaches as it is to find an agent.
9. You can’t control our client list
You are not entitled to have a say in who else we sign to our list besides you. Yes, we completely understand the competitive nature of the business, and if you feel threatened by someone new who we sign and that they might ‘replace’ you, reflect and see whether you can figure out where this is coming from. It is in all of our interests, including yours, for us to have more than one client working in the same area as this can mean a greater wealth of shared contacts, knowledge and ideas.
10. How would you prefer we spend our time?
You are not the only client we have, so please be mindful of the pressure on our time. An agent with 60 clients on their list has less than one hour per client per week, and this doesn’t include knowledge-sharing meetings, meetings with potential buyers and admin. It’s more realistic to assume that each client will get less than 30 minutes of their agent’s time per week and, trust me, you want that time to be spent on putting you forward for work and not chatting with you on the phone for a catch-up.
Top tip: Yes, it is important to update your agent (see point number two), but make sure you have something that you need to talk about and some ideas of ways you want to move forward before scheduling the conversation.
11. Ideas breed more ideas
Asking us ‘what else can I do?’ as if we know the magic recipe is deeply frustrating. It’s much better for you to brainstorm some solutions first, and then run it past us. Ideas breed more ideas and it’s always more motivating to help someone who is already helping themselves, rather than someone who is looking to us for a full deep-sea rescue.
Remember, we’re on your side, but you should be on ours, too. Thanks to all my agent colleagues who have contributed to this month’s column.
