IPC Paralegal - Latin America Practice
International Private Client (“IPC”) Practice Paralegal—Latin America Practice
Position responsible for assisting lawyers in various types of international disputes, investigations, and litigation in a fast-paced and dynamic practice. This includes preparation of legal documents, open source and legal research, and briefing materials. Position would also be responsible for some administrative tasks, such as maintenance of case files and meeting minutes. Strong work ethic, critical thinking skills, writing skills, communication skills, and flexibility are required. Successful candidates are driven, analytical, and intellectually curious. Native/fluent proficiency in Spanish or Portuguese is a requirement for this role.
ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:
- Gather, organize, summarize, and analyze various sources for upcoming, pending, and potential litigation, including legal and other public documentation.
- Draft and amend research memoranda under attorney supervision regarding relevant factual background as assigned.
- Draft correspondence, discovery requests and responses, and other related documents as necessary and assigned.
- Maintain all filings of legal records, memoranda, and correspondence for the assigned cases.
- Research law sources by identifying applicable statutes, judicial decisions, and codes.
- Attend client and vendor meetings to memorialize discussion. Strong interpersonal skills are required.
- For those with language skills, open-source research and translation in the other language will be required.
- Coordinate with multiple case teams, including outside counsel, regarding case status and logistics.
- Monitor, review, and analyze international media to inform case team as assigned.
- Demonstrable native/fluent language skills are necessary for this role. This includes the ability to speak fully in Spanish and/or Portuguese, write and read email and other written correspondence, and author documents in Spanish and/or Portuguese.
SECONDARY RESPONSIBILITIES:
- May perform cite checking and/or bluebooking as assigned.
- May perform machine translations as assigned.
- Provide various administrative support duties for IPC attorneys.
- Work on special research projects as assigned.
- Contribute to team effort to accomplish related results as needed.
QUALIFICATIONS: To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty with a high degree of competence. Strong critical thinking, writing, and organizational skills are required. Excellent interpersonal skills are essential for interactions with all levels of Firm personnel, clients, and vendors. The successful IPC paralegal is detail-oriented and self-motivating. Strong research skills are required, which includes open source and legal research. Position requires strong client service orientation, excellent communication, and decision-making skills. Position requires the ability to work independently and as a team player across multiple case teams. The ability to manage deadlines and understand fact patterns across multiple cases in a fast-paced environment is essential to succeed in this role. Cultural competency, i.e. the ability to interact effectively with people from diverse international and political backgrounds, is required of IPC paralegals.
EDUCATION AND /OR EXPERIENCE:
Bachelor’s degree. Preferable to have an interest in foreign affairs and international relations.
LANGUAGE SKILLS:
Strong reading comprehension skills, which include the ability to read, analyze, and interpret general business periodicals, professional journals, technical procedures, documents containing legal terminology or governmental regulations. Ability to draft correspondence and reports as assigned, demonstrating excellent English language skills and attention to detail. Ability to convey complex topics in a simple fashion for case team, clients, and vendors. Strong writing skills are necessary--writing samples will be required for this position.
Spanish and/or Portuguese proficiency will be evaluated during the interview process. This will include assessments of conversational skills, reading comprehension, and live translation skills.
MATHEMATICAL SKILLS:
Ability to add, subtract, multiply, and divide in all units of measure, using whole numbers, common factors, and decimals. Ability to compute rate, ratio, and percent and to draw and interpret bar graphs.
TECHNICAL SKILLS:
Basic knowledge of PC and Microsoft Office products such as PowerPoint and Excel and other software programs designed for litigation support.
PHYSICAL DEMANDS:
The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. Travel is a component of the position, and so physical capability to travel domestically and internationally will be required.
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit and exhibit finger and hand dexterity. The employee frequently is required to talk or hear. The employee must regularly lift and/or move up to 10 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, and ability to adjust focus.
AVAILABILITY REQUIREMENTS:
- Attendance Requirement
Must maintain regular and acceptable attendance at such level as is determined in the Firm’s sole discretion.
- Regular Hours Requirement
The normal hours for the position require at least 7.5 hours per day, 37.5 hours per week. However, given the international nature of the work, applicant must be flexible to work outside of the traditional 9-5 as the Firm determines is necessary or desirable to meet its business needs.
- Overtime Requirement
Must be available and willing to work such overtime as the Firm determines is necessary or desirable to meet its business needs. As noted, the work is international and often falls outside of normal business hours to accommodate clients.
- Weekend and Holiday Requirement
Must be available and willing to work such weekends and holidays as the Firm determines are necessary or desirable to meet its business needs.
- Travel Requirement
Must be available and willing to travel to such locations and with such frequency as the Firm determines is necessary or desirable to meet its business needs.