@Lightbrite
Paralegal
In the CTL law office, it’s a fast paced, highly responsible job that involves, interviewing clients, doing assigned research, drafting motions for attorney approval. Electronic filing of motions and lawsuits. Acting as my assistant at trial, maintaining my case files for court.
It is a highly paid position (75K -165K), only the best satisfy my demands and expectations. It can lead to a firm paid law school education and a full time position as an attorney in the firm (currently 4 staff attorneys @CTL started as paralegals and I paid for their law school education).
Legal secretary……………..
In our firm these are highly competent secretaries that type reports, file forms, transcribe taped or recorded meetings. They generally do not do original research (as paralegals do), they do not interview clients , either. The legal secretaries may be generalists who do work assigned by the office manager, or specialists>…such as a closing secretary who organizes all documents needed for real estate closings, or a probate secretary who just handles estate paperwork and we have a custody secretary, who deals with child custody/visitation forms for divorce clients.
Our paralegals work in the office, some of our legal secretaries telecommute.
NONE are outside contractors, all are employees. As a small, closely held firm, we tend to keep employees for a long time. One current full time associate attorney (will never be a partner as they are family members only) is the daughter of a legal secretary who has worked for me 35 years. The young lady graduated college and started teaching English, but hated it. She worked for us as a secretary one summer covering vacations. I saw the quality of her writing and offered to pay for a paralegal course. She attended evenings during the school year and worked the following summer as a paralegal. She never went back to the classroom. I also paid for law school…the investment was well worth it. Unlike the big downtown firms our associates are not under pressure to bill thousands of hours and have no home life. She married two years ago and has a baby. She currently comes into the office only about 3 hours a day and does the rest of her work at home.
