Can someone explain in detail the difference between paralegals, legal assistants, and legal secretaries?

Charis P

In the United States, the terms paralegal and legal assistant are, for the most part, interchangeable in the law community although legal assistant is somewhat of an antiquated term and I have not seen anyone hold themselves out as a legal assistant on the resumes I have reviewed over the past half decade. Professional degrees bear the title "paralegal" not "legal assistant" but there is no requirement to have a paralegal degree to work as a paralegal so I am going to collectively refer to the two as "paralegals". Paralegals assist attorneys in the preparation and organization of legal documents and have basic familiarity with the laws in their practice area to assist them with such documentation. The depth and breadth of knowledge that a paralegal has of the law varies with the experience of the paralegal and the amount of responsibility that the attorney(s) is willing to delegate to them, but many senior paralegals have a knowledge and understanding of their relative field of law that exceeds that of junior attorneys. The professional rules guiding the practice of law however require that paralegals must work under the supervision of attorneys as paralegals are not licensed to practice law.

Legal secretaries are secretaries that have enough familiarity with the legal documents to assist attorneys in organizing and keeping their files. More experienced or capable legal secretaries will sometimes have responsibilites common to those of a paralegal, but generally speaking it is not a requirment for the job. Although shorthand is a dying skill among secretaries, there are specific legal shorthand symbols that a legal secretary with shorthand skill might know.

Mali B

Usually Paralegals have training in the field, and sometimes even a certificate. Their role is a lot like a lawyer's role in the sense of writing briefs, researching, writing memos, etc. They know a lot about the law, but they don't have a license to practice, so they can't sign any legal documents like lawyers can. Legal secretaries are like any other secretary except they are familiar with legal terms, deadlines, and client confidentiality issues. Legal assistants are often law students who are interning or training to be a lawyer (or sometimes training to become a paralegal). Their role varies tremendously with the firm they work for. It can be more similar to that of the lawyer, paralegal or legal secretary. A lot of times they research, but some unfortunate souls get stuck in law firms that make they do mundane work, like answering phones or getting coffee.

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