What does a legal administrator do?
The job of legal administrative assistants is to provide support to lawyers and paralegals. They typically perform legal research, manage schedules, and draft legal-related documents. Other duties include interpreting laws, regulations, and rulings in legal documents, obtaining information from other agencies or organizations, and preparing management and legal reports. In addition, legal administrative assistants are responsible for updating and maintaining databases and ensuring to provide effective administrative assistance. They are also expected to schedule client meetings and court hearings.
Legal administrator responsibilities
Here are examples of responsibilities from real legal administrator resumes:
- Prepare and distribute payroll manage daily office operations and equipment and maintain supplies for office to run effectively.
- Provide information regarding the rules and regulations of the DMV.
- Proofread legal applications to ensure that all information have been properly submit.
- Prepare probate and estate documents, accounting statements, and estate tax returns.
- Determine adequacy and propriety of surety bonds to protect the assets of the beneficiary.
- Determine a person's eligibility to possess firearms or explosives in accordance with federal law.
- Maintain mail run daily, process, proofread documents for spelling errors and sort mail.
- Input data for reviews and revisions of customer DMV files, answering customer inquiries by telephone.
- Perform independent daily interpretation of criminal records to prevent firearms from being in the hands of prohibit persons.
- Review and verify probates, lease agreements, and conveyance documents to ensure accurate and timely distribution of Indian lands.
- Organize meetings and events, prepare PowerPoint presentations for seminars.
- Respond to subpoenas and other legal request pertaining to shareholder accounts.
- Review surety bonds and inform fiduciary of deficient or increase bonds and contact beneficiary.
- Improve performance and increase efficiency by overseeing and training legal administrative assistant to process subpoenas and wage garnishments.
- Define and implement specifications for recurring and specialize reports to assist in the litigation and administrative operations of the office.
Legal administrator skills and personality traits
We calculated that 10% of Legal Administrators are proficient in Veterans, Litigation, and PowerPoint. They’re also known for soft skills such as Communication skills, Computer skills, and Organizational skills.
We break down the percentage of Legal Administrators that have these skills listed on their resume here:
- Veterans, 10%
Completed, filed required documentation, followed up pending documents and ensure all veterans received exceptional service.
- Litigation, 10%
Facilitated responses to customer complaints from borrowers, attorneys, state and federal governmental agencies, resulting in reduced litigation exposure.
- PowerPoint, 6%
Updated PowerPoint presentation as needed.
- Law Firm, 5%
Provided superior administration of law firm specializing in insurance defense and workers' compensation law.
- Legal Research, 5%
Summarized and analyzed legal documents ensuring accuracy - Performed legal research - Prepared reports, correspondence, legal documents and declarations
- Management System, 4%
Provide administrative support to Legal Department, including the management of a company-wide contract management system.
Common skills that a legal administrator uses to do their job include "veterans," "litigation," and "powerpoint." You can find details on the most important legal administrator responsibilities below.
Communication skills. The most essential soft skill for a legal administrator to carry out their responsibilities is communication skills. This skill is important for the role because "paralegals must be able to document and present their research and related information to their supervising attorney." Additionally, a legal administrator resume shows how their duties depend on communication skills: "managed all aspects of daily legal analysis, research and due diligence of now defunct telecommunications company. "
Computer skills. Many legal administrator duties rely on computer skills. "paralegals need to be familiar with using computers for legal research and litigation support," so a legal administrator will need this skill often in their role. This resume example is just one of many ways legal administrator responsibilities rely on computer skills: "designed and implemented a comprehensive computer case management and tracking system for all litigation and transactional matters. "
Organizational skills. legal administrators are also known for organizational skills, which are critical to their duties. You can see how this skill relates to legal administrator responsibilities, because "paralegals may be responsible for many cases at one time." A legal administrator resume example shows how organizational skills is used in the workplace: "developed and maintained administrative and organizational systems essential to sustaining a contingency fee law firm. "
Interpersonal skills. For certain legal administrator responsibilities to be completed, the job requires competence in "interpersonal skills." The day-to-day duties of a legal administrator rely on this skill, as "paralegals spend most of their time working with clients and other professionals and must be able to develop good relationships." For example, this snippet was taken directly from a resume about how this skill applies to what legal administrators do: "assist counsel and paralegals legal research attend court hearings and out of court legal proceedings file maintenance interpersonal communication skills with clients. "
Research skills. A commonly-found skill in legal administrator job descriptions, "research skills" is essential to what legal administrators do. Legal administrator responsibilities rely on this skill because "paralegals gather facts of the case and research information on relevant laws and regulations to prepare drafts of legal documents for attorneys and help them prepare for a case." You can also see how legal administrator duties rely on research skills in this resume example: "researched account records and prepared supporting documentation for court hearings and other litigation matters. "
The three companies that hire the most legal administrators are:
- Robert Half9 legal administrators jobs
- AppleOne Employment Services5 legal administrators jobs
- Pacific Architects and Engineers
3 legal administrators jobs
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Compare different legal administrators
Legal administrator vs. Real estate paralegal
A Real Estate Paralegal helps real estate lawyers with a variety of tasks, such as offering advice to clients, doing research, and preparing documents. They collaborate with landlords, housing managers, or other real estate personnel.
While similarities exist, there are also some differences between legal administrators and real estate paralegal. For instance, legal administrator responsibilities require skills such as "veterans," "powerpoint," "management system," and "data entry." Whereas a real estate paralegal is skilled in "estoppel," "affidavits," "real estate transactions," and "lenders." This is part of what separates the two careers.
Real estate paralegals earn the highest salaries when working in the finance industry, with an average yearly salary of $72,649. On the other hand, legal administrators are paid more in the government industry with an average salary of $54,616.The education levels that real estate paralegals earn slightly differ from legal administrators. In particular, real estate paralegals are 5.5% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree than a legal administrator. Additionally, they're 2.4% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Legal administrator vs. Contractor-paralegal
A Contractor-Paralegal works for a law firm or corporate legal department for a specified amount of time, or for a specified task. They can be specialized in the entertainment industry or in providing services to healthcare companies and insurance providers.
While some skills are similar in these professions, other skills aren't so similar. For example, resumes show us that legal administrator responsibilities requires skills like "veterans," "management system," "data entry," and "life insurance." But a contractor-paralegal might use other skills in their typical duties, such as, "discovery responses," "contract database," "contract review," and "non-disclosure agreements."
Contractor-paralegals earn a higher average salary than legal administrators. But contractor-paralegals earn the highest pay in the finance industry, with an average salary of $79,049. Additionally, legal administrators earn the highest salaries in the government with average pay of $54,616 annually.contractor-paralegals earn similar levels of education than legal administrators in general. They're 2.9% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 2.4% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Legal administrator vs. Corporate paralegal
A Corporate Paralegal helps attorneys gather information and materials in preparation for different kinds of cases, hearings, or meetings. They also work in the legal departments of large corporations and for government agencies.
The required skills of the two careers differ considerably. For example, legal administrators are more likely to have skills like "veterans," "powerpoint," "law firm," and "data entry." But a corporate paralegal is more likely to have skills like "corporate governance," "mergers," "securities," and "excellent organizational."
Corporate paralegals earn the best pay in the finance industry, where they command an average salary of $76,737. Legal administrators earn the highest pay from the government industry, with an average salary of $54,616.Most corporate paralegals achieve a similar degree level compared to legal administrators. For example, they're 2.1% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 1.0% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.Legal administrator vs. Law clerk
Law clerks are employees in a legal firm who handle clerical tasks for the office. They handle the office's official phone lines, answering incoming calls, and making outgoing calls. They also field office correspondence, often receiving incoming mail and distributing them to their addressees. They manage office documents and ensure that they are correctly filed and labeled in their respective storage bins. Law clerks help make office life more comfortable because they make sure that the office is running well. They also manage appointments and office calendars.
Types of legal administrator
Updated January 8, 2025
