How to land a decent lit paralegal role with no experience? Forum

[RickyDnwhyc]

Is this possible?

All the job postings I'm seeing require at least 1-3 yrs of lit experience, Westlaw, Nexus, Concordance, trial experience, etc.

I'm working as a temp paralegal at a large PI/Lit firm in NYC but the work is not really of a legal nature and I get no exposure to the litigation process.

I basically sit at my desk and talk to 80 year old clients all day who half of the time forget why they called me 10 seconds into the conversation. When I'm not doing that I'm e-filing or making paper-clip-mache figurines... or stalking TLS.

I'm looking for a litigation intensive position, overtime, etc, I want to know what it feels like to work (near)lawyer hours, and get exposed to actual lawyer work; I want to go to court, etc... I feel like a fool for even considering law school before I get this done.

I would appreciate any reccomendations as to how I can break into this type of role. Ideally at a large/BigLaw firm, but I know that's asking a lot, my undergrad GPA was only a 3.4, and I don't have a lot of WE.

Should I be cold calling them and gunning my ass off? Is there a credited way to compensate for not having lit experience?

[Younger Abstention]

Paralegal jobs, especially entry level but even advanced ones too, are largely administrative. if you want to do more substantial work, try to get in with a smaller firm, but don't hold your breath. If you want to land a permanent job with no experience, try to find something that's temp-to-perm.

[RickyDnwhyc]

Paralegal jobs, especially entry level but even advanced ones too, are largely administrative. if you want to do more substantial work, try to get in with a smaller firm, but don't hold your breath. If you want to land a permanent job with no experience, try to find something that's temp-to-perm.

Even some of the temp roles are looking for experience, and the ones that aren't are usually administrative...

I'm definitely open to straight temping, temp to perm, etc, looking at everything.

I'm looking at smaller firms too, although it won't give me a complete picture of what BigLaw is like, it would at least expose me to the life of a lawyer. Problem is most of the smaller firm jobs that don't require experience are "internship-like" roles with either no pay, a small stipend, or close to minimum wage...

[RickyDnwhyc]

Beginning to think I have no choice but to take an unpaid legal internship. It seems to be the quickest way to gain exposure to any sort of substantive legal work... I don't get how 10s of thousands of undergrad students jump into law school without trying out these positions first...

[PaulKriske]

if you know any attorneys on listservs, you can sometimes find positions in smaller firms who need a hand.

i did all sorts of things.

[RickyDnwhyc]

if you know any attorneys on listservs, you can sometimes find positions in smaller firms who need a hand.

i did all sorts of things.

Man. If I knew any attorneys PERIOD I would just ask to drop in and shadow them for a couple of weeks.

[NYC2012]

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