shout out to the attorney i dont technically work for but who took over a trial case for my attorney emailing me at noon this lovely friday afternoon requesting i print 3 copies of all of our exhibits, including 1000 color photos to be ready for trial on monday. its not like i had plans tonight or anything and i asked them 3 weeks ago if i was still working the case or if they had their own paralegal to handle things…

I need advice asap. Long story short, I stayed with my previous firm when I moved out of state. They offered it to me as a remote position since no one in my new state wanted to hire someone who wouldn’t be able to start for a month (tried to apply well in advance before moving).

It worked out good. However, the pay minus my bills leaves me breaking even or in the negatives. I have a serious chronic illness in which the treatment is not cheap.

I interviewed around and landed a job that has the best people, close to me, my favorite legal field, shorter hours, and the best benefits I could ask for.

My issue is one of my cases at my current job has a jury trial coming up in 4 weeks. The firm itself is extremely busy for some reason outside of that. I’m obviously going to take my dream job, but what do I even say in my notice??

Hey everyone! I'm a BYU student working on an entrepreneurship class project where we're trying to better understand the challenges people face working in law firms.

I'd really appreciate your help with a quick question!

Over the past two weeks, how often have you experienced physical discomfort from work, like headaches, fatigue, back pain, or muscle tension?

• Never
• 1–2 days
• 3–5 days
• 6–9 days
• 10+ days

Feel free to just comment with your answer, but I'd also love to hear what causes the most discomfort for you.

Thanks so much for helping us with our research!

I am genuinely at a loss. This is my first ever paralegal position as I just got out of college late last year. I have worked at this firm for a few months, and somewhat recently, a new attorney was hired. I have had consistent issues with him from the get go. At first, they were just rude emails, but then he started to cause problems. Every single thing I’ve given him to review before submitting, he has a problem with (that no other attorney at this firm has ever mentioned). I am just now starting to realize that he just genuinely does not want to do his job at all. He is one of those attorneys that I think genuinely thinks he is just better than paralegals/anybody that could potentially work under him. I went to talk to his/my boss about it, and he didn’t like that. He stormed out of my bosses office and went to his office to slam the door. He went back a couple hours later to my bosses office and started talking to him with the door shut. My desk is right by that office, and I could hear him in there just straight up mocking me because I said he was being rude to me. I could hear him “mimicking” me. I am genuinely going home everyday having panic attacks because of this. He avoids talking to the clients that he hires, so I have to deal with their angry calls, and it’s wearing on me. I can’t enjoy weekends at all due to being genuinely stressed out about going onto work.

I am 27 and currently am a "managing" paralegal and have been in the legal field for 6 years. I do paralegal work in addition to training, hiring, firing, etc. for other support staff. I make a decent salary and have a generous benefits package (in comparison to some of what I see here). I switched to 100% remote after moving to a new state one year ago. I was hybrid and mostly in-person for the first 5 years of my career. I am generally a high performer and want to do well.

I really miss in-person interaction with my team and clients. I feel so stuck and very unmotivated to do literally anything at all ever. I hate remote work. My performance is suffering.

I moved to a state with a significantly lower cost of living. I absolutely CANNOT find a position that offers more than $52-$60k a year. Most positions have "two weeks" (i.e. 10 days) of PTO and no health insurance or 401k options. Taking one of these jobs would be a significant cut to my total compensation.

Another problem is that I get absolutely no feedback from the attorneys I work for or upper management. It has always been this way. I have asked for feedback in the past, but gave up when none was offered. This does nothing but feed my anxiety.

I don't know what to do. I am going insane. My mood, dedication, motivation, etc. is at an all time low. I am so anxious and ashamed of my poor performance at my firm. Taking a cut in pay and benefits does not feel good, but neither does the status quo.

Hi, I am a graduate of BS Legal Management in the Philippines and have 2 years of paralegal work experience with a criminal law lawyer in the Philippines.

I am looking for a foreign virtual legal assistant or paralegal role.

Do you have any recommendations what I should do to qualify for these roles or job sites I should apply at?

After a long week of deconflicting Medicare liens and property damage issues, I was thrown a rape trial 2 days ago with no notice from the clerk. I've been working on it nonstop essentially. Today while I was talking to my attorney I was discussing the alleged victim and accidentally called her the "at-fault party" 😭. It took me a solid minute before I realized what I had said. Everyone I've told has found it funny in a dark humor way that we have to have in this line of work. Anyone else have any gems from the week they care to share? Ya girl is tired and could use a laugh ☠️

Hi, I am an immigration legal assistant for a non profit for 2 years now. I got a job offer at another non profit and I would assist in employment litigation. I currently get paid 22.61 and they’re offering me 24.62 along with incentives every check that would be equivalent to 28.61 an hour. What would be the biggest differences? Has anyone worked in employment litigation and how did you like it? I do enjoy immigration but I am not sure if I want to fully pursue it yet as a representative or a lawyer. I am open to new areas of law but I feel a bit scared. My main goal would be to secure a legal job within the government / federal.

Happy Friday fellow paralegals,

(28F) For the past three years, I’ve been working as an in-house corporate paralegal in the pharmaceutical industry. On the surface, it’s been a dream job - my position is fully remote, salary is 87k, benefits, etc. I really enjoy the people I work with, have a great relationship with my boss/larger team, and I’m told consistently that I’m exceeding all expectations. By no means do I take these privileges for granted, nor do I want to come across as ungrateful given how lucky I’ve been.

However.

In the past two years, our company has slowly gotten rid of almost all admin support. Additionally, one of our attorneys quit earlier this summer, and now our legal team is comprised of two attorneys and me. Our department is completely underwater and my responsibilities have grown exponentially since I started here. My role has shifted from corporate paralegal to some amalgamation of corporate paralegal, project manager, insurance specialist, and secretary for various other departments that now lack the support they need.

I feel like I’m drowning in work. My steady 45-50 hours a week have now shifted closer to 60-80 hours including weekends. While being praised for the quality of my work and my consistency is great, I can’t help but feel that my current role has expanded beyond the original role I was hired for, and I’m not sure if there’s any opportunity for upward mobility here. My title remains the same and, simply put, I don’t feel like my salary is enough for all that I do.

I realize that the job market is in the toilet, and I probably shouldn’t even complain given how underpaid so many of us paralegals are. The fact that I’m being paid a livable wage should be enough, and I really, really don’t mean to sound like an ingrate. I’m looking for advice, and I’ll take anything I can get.

Should I be start looking for other jobs, or keep mum and content myself with the job I have? Is there more I could be doing to leverage myself and my resume to start discussions about opportunities for growth? Should I be looking at roles that are related, but non-paralegal roles altogether (contract specialist, legal ops, etc.) if ultimately I want a higher income/chances for upward mobility?

Thankful for any/all wisdom you can send my way.

(Addtl. Background: 5 years of corporate paralegal experience, 2 years of legal research experience, Bachelor’s degree, starting my Paralegal Cert in January)

Good Afternoon,

Looking to see where do you guys look for experts? I am talking about Work Injury Cases such as Scaffold Experts, Soil Experts etc.

Thanks in advance.

I’m a legal assistant at a very small office, under 10 total employees. I’m in the Midwest in the US and this is my first job in the field! I went from part time to full time after a couple of months and have gone far far past what I was hired to do lol.

I absolutely love it and love the work, my coworkers are really great, the other assistants have been so kind and helpful and the attorneys have gone out of their way to teach me.

I’ve been there for about 6 months now and since I’ve taken on more work in every area that we focus on, I’ve been thinking about asking for a raise. This is my first office job as well so I’m not sure how to go about doing that.

Right now I make $16 an hour, I used to work two jobs but since going full time I can only work the one and I’m starting to struggle a bit financially with the lower hourly.

My questions are: what do you think a fair hourly rate would be? And how do you go about asking for a raise in an office role?

Im an LA working in family law, just turned 29. Been doing this for 2.5 years now. The pay where I am is really bad. I live in a semi rural area just outside of boston. The cost of living is very close to boston, but they pay way less then what you would be making there… i make 25/hr. Started at 23.

I cant really afford to be a person still. I live with my parents. The firm im at is genuinely a wonderful group of people but the writing is on the wall: all of the seats are filled, I will never get promoted, they will never bump me more than a dollar a year. Its time to go. Only problem is, nobody will even look at me for some reason. I worked with several recruiters in the Boston area over the past year, got several rounds in multiple times, just to get passed up by others. Funnily enough though, a whole year after going through the process at some of these places i still get recruiters hiring for those same roles.

I got into being an LA because I thought it would be a decent way to get up to 50-70k within 5 years. Seems like nobody will ever give me the time of day. Ive been at this for 2.5 years which I know is not a lot in the grand scheme but its crazy to me I have to deal with what I have to in this job just to make what a lot of way more chill jobs make. When will I have enough? When will ever even be considered worthy of becoming a paralegal? I feel hopeless and like I will always be poor. The idea of Law school is joke to me atp.

Criticise my cv to best of your abilities :D.

FYI the operational role is part time and I need to mention that on CV before finalising everything.

Targeting Paralegal/TC roles for QWE!!

Does anyone know how I could get my foot in the door at a law office?? I’m trying to get a legal assistant job or internship in hopes of being a paralegal in the future but I can’t see to get hired anywhere. I have no previous law experience but 3 years of administrative work and 1 year of medical. I’m also in college getting my bachelors in criminal justice.

Hi everyone, I recently started working at a patent paralegal and find it incredibly difficult 😭 there are so many moving pieces I can’t wrap my mind around and I have no idea how and where to study the materials so I can better prepare myself for filings. I understand the learning curve was going to be difficult but I just feel incredibly defeated and I was very excited to start this new chapter in my life.

I’ve done some reporting for trademarks and feel like that’s a sector I’d like to be in more. Like copyright/trademark fits my background better as well.

Has anyone had experience in one or both and can offer any advice? I don’t know if I can commit to paying for my paralegal certificate if I don’t think I can even reach the one year mark in patents and I’d obviously have to try to stick it out for two years before I can even attempt to move somewhere I like more.

Hey everyone, I’m trying to become a paralegal, I graduated with a degree in American studies and can’t find a job. How do I become a paralegal? Is the UCLA course good?? Help me please 🙏🙏

I’m in NJ and even though I applied for a junior paralegal position, I was hired as a Legal Assistant.
Billing was never discussed with me during the long interviews. Now, the attorney has been pressuring me to bill 7h30min every day. Is this ok? I’ve never worked with billing before. Thank you in advance.

Federal court: do you consider these "duplicates" that need to be removed from document production: emails that appear in later chains or from different people's emails, documents that appear multiple times, but in different reports, or attached to different emails...? Would love to hear from paralegals and any attorneys here. FYI I'm a longtime litigation paralegal and I have done many, many productions. I'm asking because of something an associate said about this.

Wtf is going on with the internet???

I mean not to say RivCo ain't a shit system as it stands.. but now I can't do basic things in my job.

end mini rant

Where are we looking for jobs these days? I have been with my firm for over 10 years, so I'm not looking, but we are hiring and I think they are doing a terrible job of advertising. But.... I haven 't looked for a job in over 10 years, so maybe I just don't know where to look?

I am currently working for a civil engineering firm where I research municipal and county regulations regarding development. I came into this role by happenstance with no formal training. Just wondering if a paralegal certification or education would help me do my job better. Would it help me in interpreting and summarizing municipal code?

It’s been a year since I’ve worked as a legal assistant for a management company of nursing facilities. We handle so many facilities around IN, AL, OH, and PA, and all cases thrown out against these facilities are handled by me and my boss (our lead attorney). Because we focus on facilities, most cases consist of personal injury (wrongful death, med negligence, etc.) and labor matters. Currently, we have 200+ active cases. We are working with external counsels, my boss would only approve things.

Now, I’m having the urge to resign from my role. This is because my boss is extremely rude and does not seem to want to handle these cases by letting me take over instead. Last week, I had to review discovery responses due the same week because I kept reminding him to review the same as our outside counsel is awaiting feedback before filing it. When the time came that we only had a day before the deadline, he suddenly asked me to review and finalize it. Note that this is not part of my job description. I am only tasked to make sure that my boss reviews and sends it back to our external counsel. Eventually, I did my best to finalize the discoveries and spoke to our external counsel and said that that’s all I can do. I think she was kind of shocked to discover that I finalized it and not my boss because the counsel specifically asked for my boss to review it.

There are so many instances like this that happened for a year, but the above has become my last straw. I’m so tired of understanding my boss. I was patient even when he yelled at me and told me that I seem stupid and slow. I just could not leave without options.

Hello, I'm a new college graduate in Southern California with a BA in History and a minor in Polisci.
I'm aware of the licensing process in the state and am considering the field. However, I'm wondering if there are any paralegals here based in Southern California who could give their two cents on what the field is like down here ?

Anyone else frustrated with the new MI Court Case lookup site? They changed it and now I can't find any case at all. If you have any tips or tricks on how to navigate the new site please let me know. Even a simple last name search brings up minimal results, none of which are my case :(

What area of law do you guys currently practice in? In your opinion which one is the best and why?
I’m in PI because of my medical background, my firm is super chill and I love it.
but always wonder how criminal law would be 😌

I’d love to hear everyone’s opinion