A paralegal is a person who assists lawyers by performing substantive legal work under a lawyer's supervision. This allows lawyers to delegate tasks and lower legal costs for clients. To be successful, paralegals must have strong critical thinking, research, writing, and communication skills as well as knowledge of legal procedures. They conduct tasks like drafting documents, assisting with cases, and communicating with clients. However, paralegals cannot practice law independently or give legal advice. Ongoing education and certification help paralegals advance their careers and ensure quality work. Most paralegals work in private law firms to help generate revenue through their billable hours.

1. A paralegal is a person, not admitted to the practice of law, who
uses his or her education, training, and work experience to assist
the lawyer in delivering legal services to the lawyer’s client.
Paralegals perform substantive legal work that is customarily, but
not exclusively, performed by a lawyer.

2. Lawyers began using paralegals when their
clients, attentive to their profits and losses,
demanded lower legal costs while still
receiving the same quality service.

3. In order to be a successful paralegal, a person must not only
possess a common core of legal knowledge, but s/he must also
have skills that are the defining characteristics of the most
successful paralegal practitioners.

4. First of all, there are three core attributes:
Professionalism Confidentiality
Self-confidence

5. Professionalism includes not only your behavior and your
polished and poised appearance but also preventing external
personal events or dislike for a client from affecting your service
to the client. This is so important that there is an ethical rule
requiring paralegals to advise their employers if personal feelings
might interfere with the quality of service to the client.

6. Confidentiality is tantamount in the legal setting. Mislaid
papers, overheard telephone conversations, or simple gossip are
breeches of confidentiality in every situation and violating
confidentiality causes employers to doubt an employee’s
credibility.

7. Self-confidence is the ability to work unsupervised and gets all projects
completed accurately and in a timely manner and it is vital for the
success of any project.

8. Without these three core attributes, a paralegal’s skills can become
ethically or qualitatively compromised.

9. There are many skills that the successful paralegal requires that
fall under these broad categories:
Critical thinking skills Legal research skills
Organizational skills Legal writing skills
Communication skills Computer skills
Interpersonal skills Interviewing and
investigation skills

10. Critical thinking skills include:
Analyzing problems by
identifying and evaluating
alternative solutions.
Identify interrelationships among
cases, statutes, regulations, and
other legal authorities.
Applying recognized legal
authority to a specific
factual situation.

11. Then, there are organizational skills that include:
Categorizing information
Prioritizing information
Organizing information
Utilizing time efficiently

12. General communication skills require:
Reading with comprehension.
Writing and speaking in
clear, concise, and grammatically
correct English.
Listening effectively and accurately
to interpret nonverbal
communication.
Using language to persuade.
Tailoring the nature of the communication
to maximize understanding in the
intended audience, including those with
different levels of education and cultural
backgrounds.

13. Interpersonal skills are necessary for:
Establishing rapport and interacting
with lawyers, clients, witnesses,
court personnel, co-workers, and
other business professionals.
Being diplomatic, tactful, and
assertive without being aggressive.
Working effectively as a team to
perform quality work in a timely
fashion without being offensively
competitive.

14. Then, there are legal research skills requiring:
Using resources available in a
standard law library, including
computer assisted legal research
programs like Lexis and West Law,
to locate applicable statutes,
administrative regulations,
constitutional provisions, and
other primary source materials.

15. Along with legal research skills, legal writing skills are needed to:
Report legal research findings in a standard
interoffice memo or other appropriate format.
Use the proper format and appropriate
content in drafting client correspondence
and legal documents.
Modify standardized forms found in
form books, pleadings files, or a
computer data bank.
Use appropriate citations for
sources.

16. Computer skills include:
Using the basic features of a
computer assisted legal research
program and other electronic
resources.
Using the basic features on one
commonly used word processing
program, database program, and
spreadsheet program.

17. Finally, a paralegal needs interviewing and investigation skills involving:
Conducting an effective
interview and recording
appropriate, accurate
statements.
Gaining access to information
commonly kept by government
agencies.
Preparing releases and requests
to gain access to medical and
corporate records.

18. With these skills the paralegal can successfully perform the typical day-
to-day activities the lawyer needs to serve the interests of his or her
client. Typical day-to-day paralegal activities include:

19. Client contact
Most paralegals assist lawyers by
serving as the first line of
communication with the client, thus
freeing the lawyer to perform other
functions.

20. Client Interviews
The lawyer needs to know
the facts of the client’s
legal problems in order to
provide good legal service.
Therefore, paralegals have
specific skills in client
interviewing and fact
identification.

21. Docket control
Nearly every legal task has
a deadline. A document
must be filed with the
court, a contract must be
signed, or a response to a
request for information is
due. In the office, the
paralegal is responsible for
tracking deadlines and
other important dates for
lawyers.

22. Legal Drafting
A paralegal is able to prepare
legal documents under the
supervision of a lawyer,
including drafts of pleadings,
contracts, deeds, or wills for
review by the lawyer, as well as
routine legal correspondence
and inter-office memoranda.

23. Additionally, paralegals also have an economic role – courts have
validated the role of the paralegal as a viable member of the legal
services delivery team by allowing paralegal to carry out many of the
tasks, under the supervision of an attorney that might otherwise be
performed by a lawyer and billed at a higher rate.

24. These other duties include:
•Assistance with depositions, interrogatories, and document production.
•Summarizing depositions, interrogatories, and testimony for review by the
attorney.
•Drafting correspondence.
•Appearing in court for uncontested matters and small probate hearings.
•Signing form pleadings.
•Handling personal bankruptcies.
•Attending executions of wills, real estate closings, depositions, court or
administrative hearings and trials with attorneys.

25. Atypical paralegal activities depend on:
•The needs of the lawyer and
the client,
•The type of legal services
provided within the legal
environment,
•The credentials of the
paralegal,
•The personnel involved in the
delegation decision, and
•How the paralegal is utilized.

26. For example, the typical duties of paralegals in the criminal defense
field and litigation field are similar while their other duties vary vastly
according to what duties are required in that field.
• Criminal Defense Litigation
• I. Pre-Trial Commencement of Action
• A. Initial Interviews Discovery
• B. Investigation Settlement and related matters
• C. Legal Research for Pretrial Motions Pretrial Preparation
• and Trial Trial
• D. Assist in Development of Defenses,
• Theory of Case and Trial Strategy
• E. Pretrial Motions and Discovery
• Responses
• F. Plea Negotiations
• G. Assemble File
• H. Subpoena Preparation
• I. Venire Investigation
• J. Draft proposed direct and cross examination
• questions for client and witnesses.
• K. Assist attorney in preparation of defendant
• and witnesses for trial testimony.
• L. Attend pretrial conference with attorney.
• M. Draft proposed jury instructions.
• N. Coordinate appearance of witnesses
• at trial.
• II. Trial
• Prepare trial file/notebook, including:
• Second Chair Trial
• III. Post-Trial
• IV. Appeal

27. There is much required of a paralegal as he or she assists the lawyer.
However, there are some tasks that a paralegal can never do.
A paralegal must not perform any of the duties that only attorneys may
perform nor take any actions that attorneys may not take.

28. Generally, most descriptions of the kinds of activities that constitute
the practice of law are divided into four broad categories:

29. Establishing the attorney-client relationship
The paralegal cannot suggest to the client that an
attorney will or will not represent that client
because the paralegal then inadvertently creates
an unauthorized attorney-client relationship.

30. The giving of legal advice
The ABA defines the practice of
law as the exercise of
professional judgment on the
specific legal problems of a
client. Clients expect that the
advice they receive comes from
someone with the training and
expertise to provide that legal
advice.
A client who is aware of the
relationship between the
paralegal and the lawyer may
assume that the advice coming
from the paralegal has been
substantiated by the lawyer and
therefore that advice is proper,
legal, and competent.

31. Independent Document Drafting
For example, preparing and
filing bankruptcy petitions,
statements, and schedules. In
this example the paralegal
could only fill the bankruptcy
form with whatever information
the client furnished them.

32. Setting legal fees
The paralegal cannot agree to
charge a client a specific fee as
he or she does not have the
experience required to consider
all of the factors that comprise
legal fees. The cost of legal fees
is a discussion between the
attorney and his or her client
prior to the attorney agreeing
to represent the client.

33. In court representation
Only a lawyer with his or her years of specific
training in the rules of procedure and evidence
that apply to court proceedings can represent
another person in court whereas any authorized
role the paralegal has in court is comparatively
microscopic.

34. Akin to the unauthorized practice of law are ethical issues. A paralegal
can be unethical in many different ways:

35. When a paralegal is not yet competent enough assist a client in a
task delegated by a lawyer, but to try and save face, he or she
executes that task anyway. The paralegal must inform the lawyer
of his or her inexperience in a legal task before engaging in it.

36. A lawyer compensates a paralegal
based on the quantity and quality
of the paralegal’s work and the
value of that work to the law firm.
The paralegal’s compensation may
not be contingent, by advance
agreement, upon the profitability
of the lawyer’s work. There is no
ethical prohibition against allowing
paralegals to share in the overall
financial good fortune of the firm.
However, when the paralegal desires a portion of the fees the lawyer
collects from the client then an ethical concern arises. Now, the
paralegal’s focus is not on impartially gathering information for the
lawyer but rather doing whatever it takes to make certain that the
paralegal collects his or her bounty from the attorney’s collected fees.

37. When the interests of one client supersede the interests of another
client then this is an ethical issue. A paralegal must avoid any situation
where the paralegal cannot devote all of his or her loyalty to one client
rather than between two current clients or one current client and a
past client.

38. Whenever a paralegal breeches the confidentiality of the client an
ethical concern arises. Possible breeches of confidentiality include
sending an email intended for the client to another person accidentally
carbon copied on the message, operating any type of phone with the
speaker phone activated, and informing friends or relatives about
client matters.

39. Moving on, you should not view your current paralegal education as
only one step in your legal education. Consider other education
opportunities because continuing education is tantamount to the
ongoing success of any paralegal.

40. After a student at Miller-Motte acquires his or her associate’s
degree,
their next goal should be
becoming a certified legal
assistant offered by the National
Association of Legal Assistants
and Paralegals or NALA.

41. Occasionally, paralegals call themselves “certified” by virtue of completing a
paralegal training course, or another type of paralegal education. However,
although a school may award a certificate of completion, this is not the same
as earning professional certification by an entity such as NALA. In this
instance, the school’s certificate is designation of a training program.
I’m not
certified!?!

42. To be eligible to take the CLA, a paralegal must meet one of the
following conditions:

43. Proven graduation from a paralegal program that meets NALA requirements.
Have a bachelor’s degree plus one year experience as a paralegal.
Have a high school diploma or equivalent plus seven years experience as a
paralegal plus a minimum of 20 hours of continuing legal education
completed within two years prior to application to take the test.

44. Certification means passing the certified paralegal exam which
is divided into 5 sections:
•Communications
•Ethics
•Legal research
•Judgment & analytical ability, and
•Substantive law.

45. The CLA designation is important
because it assures a hiring lawyer that
he or she is dealing with an
experienced legal assistant who
performs to a high standard and can
immediately bring experience and
capability to the practice.

46. NALA claims that courts have awarded higher fees to paralegals with
the CLA designation, and also receive higher salaries nationwide.

47. NALA also offers continuing education with the CLA specialty
credential for those who have “demonstrated advanced
knowledge and skills in a specialty area of practice:”

54. The National Federation of Paralegal Associations offers a competing
certification: the Paralegal Advanced Competency Exam (PACE).

55. Tier One of the exam tests critical-thinking skills and problem-solving
abilities, and includes general legal questions and incorporates ethics
throughout the exam.
Tier Two tests knowledge of specific legal practice areas.
To be eligible to take the PACE exam, the paralegal must also have a
four-year degree.

56. Continuing education demonstrates a paralegal’s commitment to professional
excellence. Nearly all of the organizations available to help paralegals have
continuing education opportunities including NALA which has its Campus Self
Study Program covering these topics:

57. Alternative methods of dispute resolution
American Legal system
Civil litigation
Contract law
Judgment and legal analysis
Legal ethics
Legal research
Real estate
Written communications

58. The NALA is just one of the many associations that exist to assist paralegals.
Membership in paralegal organizations carries distinct advantages for practicing
paralegals, including support, professional networks, job banks, continuing legal
education, access to seminars, and social opportunities. Professional organizations can
serve as a resource for information and news about the paralegal profession and often
publish newsletters and journals. Paralegal organizations offer scholarships and
discounted memberships for students.

59. Almost every state in the country boasts a statewide professional organization for legal
assistants, as well as one or more local organizations. Usually the statewide
organization will be located in the state’s capital city and the local organizations are
located in the larger metropolitan areas. These organizations may not be affiliated
with the state or local bar associations.

60. Bar association advantages and benefits:
• Paralegals have a vote in decisions that affect them.
• Paralegals are permitted to join bar association
committees, sections, and divisions.
• Paralegals have same or equivalent benefits of membership
that are provided to other members of the bar association.
• Paralegals are encouraged to write for publications that
promote the cost-efficient utilization of paralegal
services, and those publications are supported and/or
published by the bar association.
• Paralegal’s opinions pertaining to the role of paralegals are
valued by members of the bar.

61. The traditional employers of paralegals are private law firms. Roughly 3 of 4
working paralegals are employed by law firms of widely varying sizes.
However, over the years, pressure for efficient and low-cost legal services has
opened opportunities for paralegals in:

62. • Corporate legal department
• Banks and Insurance companies
• Government (local, state, Federal)
• Title and mortgage companies
• Healthcare

63. In the private law firm, the
paralegal’s role is to be an income
producer by bringing money into
the firm through billable hour
production. These are the tasks that
would, without the paralegal, be
performed by an attorney within the
law firm.

64. The private law firm expects the paralegal to bring in more money through
their billable hours than the law firm pays them in salary, thus allowing the
law firm to realize a net profit from their effort. Therefore, most law firms
expect the paralegal to bring in, through billable hours, three times their
gross salary.

65. Employer law firms range from
a single lawyer to several
hundred lawyers in several
cities. The vast majority of
paralegals work for law firms
with ≤ 10 lawyers. The size of
the paralegal staff within a
private law firm will generally
bear some relationship to the
numbers of lawyers working
within the firm. The average
ratio of attorneys to paralegals
is about 2-to-1.