Paralegal Assistants

Paralegal assistants are mostly employed in law firms, government agencies, and corporate legal departments. Typically, a paralegal assistant works in the legal profession as an assistant to a lawyer. A paralegal assistant is a certified and trained person.

Job Responsibilities

A paralegal assistant is also known as a legal assistant. Legal assistants often assist lawyers in their cases. They provide assistance in drafting contracts and other legal documents. Legal assistants are responsible for conducting legal research. Very often they provide the legal research needed to build up a case. They are responsible for drafting legal memos. They also assist the lawyers in maintaining files of the cases they are currently handling.

In many law firms, legal assistants perform the initial interview of the clients and/or witnesses. The job responsibilities of a paralegal assistant are actually defined by the area he or she is working in. For instance, a paralegal assistant employed in a law firm specializing in family and divorce law would be responsible for drafting legal documents relating to divorce, adoption, custody agreements and prenuptial agreements.

A paralegal assistant who works with a real estate firm would be required to be present at the closing of all real estate deals.

Paralegal assistants who work in a corporation are required to prepare annual reports and review government regulations. Their responsibilities also include filing articles of incorporation, drawing up contracts, and/or drafting partnership agreements. Those who work with a government agency are required to research laws, regulations and/or policies.

It is obvious that in order to be successfully employed as a paralegal assistant, one needs to be trained and certified. Moreover, there are certain skills that every good paralegal assistant needs to posses.

Necessary Skills

Legal assistants need to have good critical thinking skills, since they are required to analyze a problem and identify and provide alternative solutions. When working in a law firm, they would often be required to assess which areas of the law are relevant to a particular case.

Besides great critical thinking skills, they also need to have great organizational skills. After all, they will be required to sort information, prioritize assignments and manage information.

Since legal assistants need to deal with clients, they need to have good communication skills. This is also important because they will be working as a team.

Research and writing skills are critical to the success of a paralegal assistant. They are responsible for providing the research material needed for developing arguments in a case. Whether they are employed in a law firm, government agency or corporation, legal assistants are required to do a lot of research and writing.

Since this is the age of the computer, a paralegal assistant must have computer skills.

These are some of the basic skills that paralegal assistants should have in order to succeed in their career field.