Litigation Legal Secretary
Career Area: Clerical and Administrative
Occupation Group: Administrative Assistants
Salary
Percentile wages tell how much a certain percentage of an overall population in a geographic area or within a given industry or field makes. The percentile wage estimate is the value of a wage below which a certain percent of workers fall.
An example would be the 25th percentile, 25 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 75 percent earn more than the estimated wage value. At the 75th percentile, 75 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 25 percent earn more than the estimated wage value.
A typical Litigation Legal Secretary earns the following wages (national and state):
State
The average salary in North Carolina for those pursuing this career is $40,787
National
The average salary in the United States for those pursuing this career is $52,199
What Does a Professional in this Career Do?
Provides secretarial and administrative work for a litigation attorney or litigation law firm. Uses specialized knowledge of legal terminology and procedures related to litigation. Organizes files, schedules meetings and manages communication to prepare for lawsuits and trials. Prepares and files documents for court cases. Works with supervision from an attorney or paralegal; may handle paralegal tasks.
Employment Trends
The job demand and job growth statistics shown here were derived from job posts over the past year. Expected job growth projections are extrapolated from year-over-year job post listing history.
Job demand and job growth is expected at the following rates:
| Location | Growth | |
|---|---|---|
| North Carolina | 9 | -20.2% |
| Nationwide | 3080 | -20.9% |
Skills
A professional in this position typically utilizes the following skills in the course of everyday work in this exciting and challenging field:
Baseline Skills
The following are baseline skills every Litigation Legal Secretary is expected to have in order to experience success in this field:
- Communication Skills: The ability to convey information to another effectively and efficiently.
- Organizational Skills: Experience with a systematic process of structuring, integrating, co-ordinating task goals, and activities to resources in order to attain objectives.
- Microsoft Office: Microsoft Office is an office suite of applications, servers, and services developed by Microsoft.
- Detail-Oriented: A detail oriented person is someone who pays attention to the details and can make a conscious effort to understand causes instead of just the effects, and that does this in a second nature type of way.
- Microsoft Excel: Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet developed by Microsoft for Windows, macOS, Android and iOS. It features calculation, graphing tools, pivot tables, and a macro programming language called Visual Basic for Applications.
Specialized Skills
These skills are specific to working in this career:
- Litigation: Working experience of Litigation. Litigation is the term used to describe proceedings initiated between two opposing parties to enforce or defend a legal right. Litigation is typically settled by agreement between the parties, but may also be heard and decided by a jury or judge in court.
- Legal Support: Working experience of Legal Support, which is the ability to file papers appropriately, take dictation, set up meetings and help prepare presentations.
- Administrative Support: Working experience providing various kinds of administrative support and services to people and groups in business operations. These include mailing, scanning, maintaining an electronic and hard copy filing system, performing data entry, managing calendars, etcetera.
- Legal Documentation: Working experience of Legal Documentation. Documentation is material that provides official information or evidence or that serves as a record.
- Civil Litigation: Working experience in the non-criminal stream of actions in law.
Distinguishing Skills
Any Litigation Legal Secretary that possesses the following skills will stand out against the competition:
- Preparation of Pleadings: A pleading is a formal written statement of a party's claims or defenses to another party's claims in a civil action. The parties' pleadings in a case define the issues to be adjudicated in the action.
- Legal Terminology:
- Legal Document Preparation: Legal instrument is a legal term of art that is used for any formally executed written document that can be formally attributed to its author, records and formally expresses a legally enforceable act, process, or contractual duty, obligation, or right, and therefore evidences that act, process, or agreement.
- Subpoena Preparation: Working experience preparing subpoenas, which are issued by government agencies, most often courts, to compel testimony by a witness or production of evidence under a penalty for failure.
- Legal Correspondence Preparation: Working experience of Legal Correspondence Preparation, which is Correspondence refers to communication by the exchange of letters. It also means the letters written or received. The letters written by one to another, and the answers thereto, make what is called the correspondence of the parties. In general, the correspondence of the parties contains the best evidence of the facts to which it relates.
Salary Boosting Skills
A professional who wishes to excel in this career path may consider developing the following highly valued skills:
- Legal Document Editing: Working experience of Legal Document Editing. Legal editors perform copyediting, content editing and proofreading for a variety of legal publications. Legal editors must have excellent knowledge of grammar, usage, punctuation, and style as well as a keen attention to detail and the ability to meet tight deadlines. A knowledge of legal terminology is also essential.
Experience
This position typically requires the following level of experience. The numbers presented in the pie charts below were derived from actual job posts over the past year. Not all job postings list experience requirements.
| Experience Required | % |
| 0 to 2 years | 20% |
| 3 to 5 years | 74% |
| 6 to 8 years | 4% |
Many of the programs offered through NC State are designed for working professionals who need additional credentials to enhance existing work experience.
Students who do not have the expected level of experience may wish to look into internship and employment opportunities.
Common Job Titles
It is possible to find work in this field in positions commonly listed as the following job titles:
- Legal Secretary
- Litigation Secretary
- Litigation Legal Secretary
- Legal Secretary - Litigation
- Legal Secretary Litigation
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