Beyond fiduciary duty, discuss the two primary duties that an agent has to his or her clients.
Duty of Loyalty:
The agent's primary duty is the duty of loyalty. This means that the agent must act solely and completely for the benefit of the principal. If an agent's interests become adverse to those of the principal, the agent must put the principal's interest first. This also means that the agent can't use their status as the principal's agent to enter them into agreements without telling the principal of the agreement first. Any information the agent gains about the principal while acting within the scope of employment can not be used for the agent's benefit with out first getting the principal to agree even after termination of the agency relationship.
Duty of Obedience:
The agent is under the duty of obedience to follow all reasonable instructions given by the principal. This means even if the principal gives instruction to the agent to do something that might harm only the principal's interest, the duty of obedience requires the agent to perform the task as ordered. The agent should inform the principal that the desired actions could be harmful, but will have to proceed with the actions anyway if the principal still wants to go with it. This can be potentially problematic for the agent as to some principals have short memories and may later blame the agent for the harmful actions so it is important to keep documentation of the principals communicated requests.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=5920416
In this article, the head of the NFL players union held a conference to discuss the possibility of changing the certification process to become an agent as well as how agents are disciplined for violating rules. The meeting was held soon after a couple of agents had violated the NCAA rules for agent to player contact. These potential changes could effect the duties that an agent has to their principal and should be watched closely so that they can fall within the legal guidelines of agent to principal contact.
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