A legal secretary is a specialist in the field of legal office work. Going through professional training to acquire the specific knowledge and skills required to execute the duties of a Legal secretary helps an individual understand what the job entails and what is expected of him or her. You will also get to understand the different legal structures you can work in as a legal secretary.
Training courses to help you become a legal secretary are designed in such a way as to build confidence in the individual so they can carry out certain responsibilities and tasks within the job description. The most common tasks of a legal secretary will be file handling and office scheduling. These records consist of written communication, schedules for maintaining a court calendar, managing appointments and the details there of, preparation of legal documents and client billing information. The files can also include deposition information, schedules for trials, and also all the necessary documents for closing a case.
Training Courses
A legal secretary also has other tasks which can involve doing some legal research, building and maintaining periodic reports, updating the status of the different cases the firm is defending and corresponding with clients. To fully grasp all of these responsibilities and perform optimally in executing them, one will need comprehensive legal secretary training.
The training will cover legal education courses which will include computer skills like typing, and knowledge in the use of some particular computer software; Microsoft word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
In the case of a solicitor representing a client, the legal secretary is expected to handle the paperwork, so it is imperative he or she understands the importance of the legal procedure. For an accredited legal secretary, it is anticipated that you ought to know how to go about collecting all of the necessary information that is relevant to the case as you prepare and file the documents.
Depending on the solicitor, a legal secretary can be asked to follow-up on a particular subject and sometimes he or she may have to attend a court hearing. Many types of legal secretary training courses exist today, and there are many to choose from. Depending on the specific field of concentration which can either be real estate planning that involves drafting and preparation of wills, revocable trusts as well as irrevocable trusts or just assisting a family solicitor in preparing relevant documents related to divorce, adoptions and much more.
With training, it is possible to act as a paralegal depending on the size of the firm. Your level of qualification will also determine if you will be required to submit billable hours of work that could have been done by a solicitor.
Profession
The legal secretary profession can be a very demanding one, their importance to the legal structure is absolute. Solicitors value hard working legal secretaries especially if the individual understands his or her duties and takes the step to perform to the best of their abilities. The difference between a legal secretary and an administrator is in the knowledge of the operations and the responsibilities they handle. For a legal secretary, you have to understand how your firm operates, maybe not in great detail, but the fundamental processes which requires your input and that of the solicitor you are working for at that moment.
This post was written and supplied on behalf of Souters, specialists in legal secretary training.
