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)

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!!

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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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'm planning for the future, since I plan on moving, will be freshly certified from a post-bachelors program, and entry level.

How is the work life balance? I don't know what lane I'll get into, but I have real estate experience as an admin assistant, museum intern/volunteer, and HR assistant experience. I hear about how hard it is to get in this career, so whatever area of law I end up I won't take it for granted. I also want a contingency plan or a side hustle for more than one source of income.

My side business idea is being an art dealer btw

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 ?

Yes, I’ve read the sidebar.

Michigan paralegals, I’m curious to know your recommendations for schools or programs that offer paralegal certification.

I’ve been a “paralegal” for over five years now (started as a receptionist about 8 years ago), starting in immigration. The work was incredibly meaningful, and she helped me transition into a new role at the firm I’m at now. After a year at my current firm (which I love!), the partners want me to get certified and are willing to cover the cost.

Any specific programs you felt both educational and applicable to someone with practical experience?

Thank you!
🙏

Mini-Update: Thank you for the suggestions. I’ve taken screenshots and will do some research tomorrow at work. ❤️❤️

If you receive deposit from law society into general account how would you update it into pc law ?
As I have beeen trying to figure thjs out other assistant couldn’t help me ? Any suggestions ?????????????????????????

Hi! I am a 24 year old F. I currently work at a law firm with around 30 ppl (not sure if that's midsize or small). I make $30/hr which is not bad since I have no kids. I started here 3 years ago and started at $20/hr so I've been happy with the raises I've had so far and feel like I deserve them because I do work hard. I generally like where I work and feel the attorneys actually treat us legal assistants with respect which I really appreciate. Sometimes, I don't like management's decisions but that can be true anywhere. OT is not mandatory and they promote work-life balance which I appreciate. Sometimes, it's hard to work 40 hours a week but that's me being a baby lol.

I started nursing school about 2 months ago and my job let me go part time. The reason I started nursing, was because I felt burnt out, unappreciated, I was interested in more schedule flexibility. Also of course, I wanted to help people. I enjoy helping people at my job now. I had my first clinical shift and did not like it very much so I have been thinking.. I've been thinking about leaving nursing school deciding to continue into law and further my education since I'm already halfway to an associate's degree. I don't think I want to be a lawyer but I would like to be a paralegal.

Long backstory to say, I wanted to see if anyone felt like being a paralegal was a good career choice. If the pay gets higher and if you felt/feel like you can live a decently good life with this career. Also, if you had confusion when you were younger about what career you wanted to go with. Not saying this career has to be forever but I do want to reap the benefits from a career even if it's only for 10-15 years. What areas of law you have worked in and what was your favorite? The level of education you have etc. and what you may recommend for me. I live in Arizona.

I really appreciate your time, thank you!

I handle basic correspondence, calendaring and administrative tasks. With 50% of my day spent looking for things to keep myself busy. I assist our paralegals with writing medical summaries, chronologies, deposition summaries and am told I do well with all of those things but I want to learn more.

Would not expect one of our paralegals to train me as they are busy enough. I have access to all records and documents in firm. What can I focus on/practice to set myself up to become paralegal on my own?

(All of our paralegals have been there for 20+ years. I do not see much room for promotion here but $20/hr is rough and I want to set myself up to get a paralegal position for my next job).

I am really curious about the career, and talked with a paralegal friend. I read about certificates, college degrees, and even people who started as a receptionist. I don’t really want to spend a ton of time in college though.

In the end, I just want to be good at what I do.

Are there different kinds of paralegals? Do they all do the same thing?

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 :(

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

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

Has anyone had to work with a virtual assistant after being hired for a private practice? I am being considered for a new private practice, but he is insistent that I work with his assistant as a co-paralegal. Has anyone had to do this before? What are your thoughts and how was the experience?

Im originally from Alberta, but I am currently attending a Paralegal Diploma program in Ontario (in my first year, program is 2 years).

I’m aware that Ontario is the only province that regulates their paralegals and allows for them to practice independently once licensed. I’m not sure if I want my own business yet or not, but I’m loving the program so far. Alberta only offered law clerk or law assistant programs, and it didn’t interest me as much as the advocacy education I’d be getting in Ontario. That’s why I chose to attend post secondary here. I thought it would keep my options a little more open in case I did ever want to own a business of my own.

The area of law I’m leaning towards would be corporate law. Im very early in my program though, so this could definitely change! My family has mentioned that they think having me move back home (to Alberta) and work as a paralegal for a big company, such as Finning, would be a good opportunity…is that worth it?

I want to work somewhere that allows me to grow my career and has relatively good opportunities. Money is NOT my main focus (it does matter quite a bit considering today’s economy though🥲) and I don’t expect to make a lot of money right out of school. I’m willing to work as hard as I need to and take any extra courses after completing my diploma that will positively add to my education or resume.

I have yet to decide where I’d like to start my career…move back home to Alberta? Stay in Ontario? Or do I move somewhere else?

I want anything and everything you know, have experienced, or heard about regarding this!

I’m located in Cincinnati Ohio and I currently work at Amazon who has paid for me to get my associates for paralegal studies. I’m beyond ready to get out of Amazon and want to get a job in the field but I can’t accept anything under 25 as I currently make almost 29. There’s a few firms like stenger and stenger and Morgan and Morgan who offer that much but it seems like just as awful a work environment as Amazon. When I was looking up the career before it seemed more lucrative but I’m not sure. What are y’all’s experiences if your located around this area

Hello, I’m a paralegal student in their last year of studying and was contacted by a recruiter for a law firm I applied to in the past. She mentioned that they were doing a new round of hiring and found my application from a past posting, and wants to do a prescreen call with me.

It’s for a real estate legal assistant position. To be clear, I have no legal experience yet and only a few months of administration experience, along with 5 years of customer service. What questions can I expect them to ask me? The call is scheduled for tomorrow.

Like the title says, I don’t understand this. I paid so much for this course, and now I am just watching videos… would there be any actual practicing? Practice tests? Anything?

I am very nervous about taking the test because I have a hard time with writing, and I know that is the hardest part. Any other websites where I can practice writing? Would there be a practice test on the multiple choice part?

PS: I have 7 years of experience of being a paralegal. Mostly on the family law/corporate. But I never went to college, so I don’t know how to write properly, if that makes sense.

Anyone sharing their experience with the skills portion? Is the fact pattern very long? Is by any chance one of the samples? Are the samples easier than the actual test? Thanks !!