What Does a Legal Secretary Do?

In this section, we compare the average legal secretary annual salary with that of a district court administrator. Typically, district court administrators earn a $15,362 higher salary than legal secretaries earn annually.

While their salaries may differ, one common ground between legal secretaries and district court administrators are a few of the skills required in each craft. In both careers, employees bring forth skills like legal research, court appearances, and district court.

There are some key differences in responsibilities as well. For example, a legal secretary responsibilities require skills like "litigation," "legal correspondence," "dictation," and "law firm." Meanwhile a typical district court administrator has skills in areas such as "court operations," "police reports," "court administration," and "administrative capacity." This difference in skills reveals how truly different these two careers really are.

District court administrators tend to reach higher levels of education than legal secretaries. In fact, district court administrators are 5.9% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 12.6% more likely to have a Doctoral Degree.

Next up, we have the service officer profession to look over. This career brings along a higher average salary when compared to a legal secretary annual salary. In fact, service officers salary difference is $6,822 higher than the salary of legal secretaries per year.

A similarity between the two careers of legal secretaries and service officers are a few of the skills associated with both roles. We used resumes from both professions to find that both use skills like "subpoenas," "powerpoint," and "district court. "

While some skills are similar in these professions, other skills aren't so similar. For example, several resumes showed us that legal secretary responsibilities requires skills like "litigation," "legal correspondence," "dictation," and "law firm." But a service officer might use skills, such as, "customer service," "financial services," "patrol," and "veterans."

It's been discovered that service officers earn higher salaries compared to legal secretaries, but we wanted to find out where service officers earned the most pay. The answer? The finance industry. The average salary in the industry is $65,804. Additionally, legal secretaries earn the highest paychecks in the professional with an average salary of $49,727.

On the topic of education, service officers earn higher levels of education than legal secretaries. In general, they're 7.7% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 12.6% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.

The third profession we take a look at is litigation paralegal. On an average scale, these workers bring in higher salaries than legal secretaries. In fact, they make a $16,759 higher salary per year.

By looking over several legal secretaries and litigation paralegals resumes, we found that both roles utilize similar skills, such as "litigation," "law firm," and "travel arrangements." But beyond that the careers look very different.

There are many key differences between these two careers as shown by resumes from each profession. Some of those differences include the skills required to complete responsibilities within each role. As an example of this, a legal secretary is likely to be skilled in "legal correspondence," "dictation," "scheduling appointments," and "transcription," while a typical litigation paralegal is skilled in "discovery responses," "mediation," "excellent organizational," and "affidavits."

Interestingly enough, litigation paralegals earn the most pay in the professional industry, where they command an average salary of $64,050. As mentioned previously, legal secretaries highest annual salary comes from the professional industry with an average salary of $49,727.

Litigation paralegals are known to earn similar educational levels when compared to legal secretaries. Additionally, they're 2.0% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 3.4% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.

Paralegals tend to earn a higher pay than legal secretaries by about $8,218 per year.

While their salaries may vary, legal secretaries and paralegals both use similar skills to perform their jobs. Resumes from both professions include skills like "litigation," "legal correspondence," and "law firm. "

While some skills are shared by these professions, there are some differences to note. "dictation," "transcription," "word processing," and "administrative tasks" are skills that have shown up on legal secretaries resumes. Additionally, paralegal uses skills like discovery responses, affidavits, legal support, and due diligence on their resumes.

Paralegals earn a higher salary in the professional industry with an average of $55,416. Whereas, legal secretaries earn the highest salary in the professional industry.

Paralegals reach similar levels of education when compared to legal secretaries. The difference is that they're 1.7% more likely to earn a Master's Degree more, and 3.4% more likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.