Description:
The Agile Legal Assistant provides both administrative and practice management support to legal professionals in a variety of practice areas across the Calgary office. The position will require a confident, reliable and service-minded assistant with the ability to manage multiple tasks and adapt to changing priorities. The Agile Legal Assistant will have the opportunity to meet and work collaboratively with people across the firm, and will provide seamless service and coverage for leaves, absences, and peak work volumes, and will be assigned to a variety of firm-wide responsibilities.
The successful candidate will be organized, discreet, detail-oriented, and have a client-first approach to work. In addition, the successful applicant must be team-oriented and accustomed to working as a work team with other assistants. Generally, this is an in-office role with hours of work from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. with some flexibility required to meet client needs and personal commitments; pre-authorized overtime may be required.
Responsibilities
- Assist the Legal Support teams with overflow work and backup coverage as needed and work with Legal Support management on special projects.
- Draft, prepare and proofread correspondence, accounts and various transactional documents and forms.
- Conduct Audits as part of the firm’s Audit Inquiry team.
- Conduct regulatory proceedings reviews twice daily and completing all related administrative tasks required by the department.
- Enter and maintain lawyer’s dockets and coordinate with the Accounting Department, when necessary; preparing detailed billings.
- Responding to client inquiries expeditiously, professionally, and conducting follow up; keeping the lawyers apprised of interactions in their absence.
- Open, maintain and put away files, and maintain precedent systems using the Firm protocol for knowledge management.
- Process incoming and outgoing mail, including maintenance of email accounts and managing bring forwards.
- Prepare, manage, and update cheque requisitions and expense reports.
- Update and maintain client/matter lists and current client contact records electronically to meet Dentons’ requirements.
- General administrative duties such as scheduling appointments and meetings, photocopying materials, booking meeting rooms, making travel arrangements, etc.; working with other related departments/services internally to provide documents and other materials on time to meet client needs.
- Maintain and organize files, both electronic and hard copy as required.
- Demonstrate a team approach; support and stand in for colleagues to cover absences; ensuring strict adherence to confidentiality; accountability in relation to both internal and external clients to achieve outputs and goals for the Department and the Firm.
- Other duties as assigned.
Requirements
- Legal Assistant diploma or college certificate in office or business administration or equivalent.
- Familiarity with a law firm environment, ideally with 1 to 3 years legal assistant or legal administrative assistant experience. Preference will be given to previous experience gained within a large firm environment.
- Passion for working in a team environment, willing to help others and comfortable with sharing work assignments.
- Strong grammatical skills, including punctuation and proofreading, attention to detail and accuracy are a must.
- Ability to produce a high quality and quantity of work, occasionally under tight timelines.
- Able to meet deadlines, work well under pressure and take initiative using sound judgment.
- Strong interpersonal and communication skills (both verbal and written).
- Excellent organizational/follow up skills; attention to detail, proof reading and accuracy are required.
- Excellent organizational and follow up skills; ability to exercise sound judgment in setting priorities.
- Professional manner, ability to exercise sound judgement in setting priorities.
- Demonstrated commitment to privacy and ethical conduct.
- Digital dexterity and proficiency in Microsoft Office applications, particularly Excel, Word formatting, and Outlook contacts and calendar functions.
Additional knowledge, skills and experience preferred:
- Experience with Elite, 3E, Intapp, iManage/document management systems.
- Exposure to a variety of practice areas, with a preference for energy/regulatory, corporate, and employment/litigation experience.
- Audit experience.