Home > Talent > Certified legal assistants are as common as non-certified, and earn a tad more
Published on:

Certified legal assistants are as common as non-certified, and earn a tad more

By

According to the 2005 Hildebrandt International Law Department Survey, there are three categories of legal assistants (See my post of Aug. 21, 2005 on the differences, if any, between paralegal and legal assistant.): “Senior Legal Assistant,” “Certified Legal Assistant,” and “Legal Assistant.”

Among the 130 reporting companies, 66 had certified paralegals (475 individuals) while 73 had legal assistants (467 individuals). There was thus a one-to-one ratio between certified and non-certified paralegals between those two categories. In the category of senior paralegals, some – it is even likely much more than one half – were certified.

Median pay was about 4-6 percent more for certified paralegals (See my post of March 17, 2006 about compensation for in-house lawyers with degrees other than law degrees.).

By
Posted in: Talent
Published on:
Updated:

One response to “Certified legal assistants are as common as non-certified, and earn a tad more”

  1. CR says:
    March 20, 2006 at 11:09 am

    Rees, you may want to define what you consider to be a “certified” paralegal, as there are many definitions. Do you mean a paralegal with a certificate from an ABA-approved program (which is technically called “certificated”)? Or someone who passed the PACE or CLA or other such exam? “Certified paralegal” means different things to different people.