Fancy managing a band? Jetting around the world, bagging VIP seats at concerts, helping to throw televisions out of windows. Rock’n’roll!

Sadly, managing talent for real is more prosaic. “I got into this business for sex, drugs and rock’n’roll, now all I do is look at computer printouts of P Diddy’s record sales,” says Ed Bicknell, a senior vice-president at the William Morris Agency (WMA). Bicknell has tongue firmly in cheek, though. A manager’s job is to promote an artist’s career; this can include musicians, comedians, actors and writers. Day to day you’ll be multitasking furiously and helpful skills include straight talking, tenacity, patience and an ability to soothe egos.

Got that? Good. Now all you need is some talent to manage. Bicknell discovered Dire Straits playing in Camden in 1977. “I didn't know anything about management. I just knew I really liked this group,” he says. He now heads the WMA international music division in London, whose roster includes Take That and Snoop Dogg, after starting out as the social secretary at the University of Hull, booking acts such as Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.

It’s still a common way in, but now degrees in the subject are mushrooming. For example, the University of Sheffield runs an MA in music management. Accounting and legal skills are also vital. Graduate salaries start at about £25,000 and successful agents can earn six-figure salaries — with commission on top. But getting a foothold in the industry means starting at the bottom. At WMA, which has about 950 staff worldwide, graduates start in administrative roles, working closely alongside agents before they are let loose on any artists.

If that sounds too much like work, try being an artist yourself first. Bob James is president of the Agents’ Association and runs Artsworld International Management. His career, he says, has been a natural progression from playing in a local band at 17. “You have to know your market,” he says. “We once had someone who wanted to book Des O’Connor for an all-male audience. That was obviously wrong.”

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