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Ask HN: Is there something akin to “agents” in the software industry?

3 points by lsc ↗ HN
As a writer or an actor, my understanding is that you usually hire an agent who negotiates on your behalf, and you give them some percentage of what you make.

All of the job placement middlemen I've seen on the IT side of things are paid by my counterparty, and thus work against me when it comes time to negotiate.

From what I've seen, the difference between negotiating well and negotiating poorly is often quite large.

Does something like this exist for people in the "almost $200K/yr total compensation" range? Should something like this exist? What are the barriers to creating something like this?

2 comments

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mindcrime
There have been attempts to create something like this, yes. I don't know how successful they've been however. See:

http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-04-10/silicon-vall...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5400055

lsc
It is unclear to me who pays this agency, and "how much" is more unclear. I think that if I am your customer, it needs to be transparent to me... e.g. I know how much the end company is paying, I know how much my negotiator is taking, etc, etc.

Actually, that might be the closest we'll get to my idea; just start an agency that gets on the "preferred vendor lists" the usual way, then be transparent with the worker you are placing on what the fees are.