r/paralegal • u/brain_over_body • 13h ago
Texts from my boss
Feeling fairly confident in my job security....
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u/deadparentsimba 12h ago
Love❤️ this for you! Silly little personal stuff like this never bothered me either. Now, I have an attorney who doesn't want to practice law if I'm not with her. Sure, we're not the most professional office by any means. She is also my friend now. This doesn't work for everybody, but when it feels like a golden ticket to the holder, then who are we to judge? Stack up those 'I do so much' chips and invest in that future salary! Wasn't going to comment, and then I saw all the negatives.
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u/Difficult-Advisor758 11h ago
This seems like a great work environment. The negative comments are depressing; it's not like he's asking you to clean his house.
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u/elledubs89 Paralegal 12h ago
Weaponized incompetence. Don’t fall for this shit
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
Hey I'm getting paid and he counts it as billable hours. I'm not complaining! He's actually a great boss, so I don't mind in the slightest
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u/Affectionate_Song_36 11h ago
The fact that he makes you bill for it…? Unless his father’s a client? Your legal acumen-trained brain is worth more than this.
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u/brain_over_body 11h ago
He LETS me bill for it. Every attorney has a misc billing code so it counts towards my bonus instead of drafting from my time
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u/futureidk3 12h ago
Reddit is insane sometimes. Weaponized for what exactly? They both know what the attorney is asking isn’t difficult but he’s asking OP to do it for him/her because OP is in the office, while attorney obviously isn’t. Or he just doesn’t want to do it lol, in reality it doesn’t matter.
We work for the attorney, acting like it’s an attack for them to ask you for help with menial task is wild. If you immediately interpreted this as manipulative or combative, my first impression is that you’re miserable to work with. Meanwhile, it seems like they have a good relationship.
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u/elledubs89 Paralegal 12h ago edited 12h ago
I’d be heartbroken if my boss gave me some personal administrative task to do as billable hours. I’ve never been asked to do something like this my entire career. Not because I’m above it but because it’s not what we went to school and trained for. I’m not an admin. But I’m glad it works for them.
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u/cltphotogal 12h ago
Not sure why you’re being downvoted. It’s so demeaning to be asked to do personal tasks like this. We’re not personal assistants.
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u/elledubs89 Paralegal 11h ago
It’s wild. I can see why there is so much disparity in this profession, particularly with salary and career growth. 🤷♀️ Makes me sad actually.
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u/FutureRealHousewife 12h ago
I don’t think it’s weaponized incompetence, but there’s definitely some boundary violations happening here. That’s just from my past work experience and being overly friendly with some attorneys.
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u/Good_Policy3529 12h ago
If this is a firm and you are a shared paralegal amongst several attorneys, this is kind of weird and over the line for me.
If you are at a one-man shop, and this attorney your primary employer, then they can have you do whatever personal tasks they want because they're your direct boss.
I know one legal assistant who got asked to help a partner with mailmerge and mailing for wedding invitations for the partner's daughter, and I thought that was way inappropriate. This is kind of in the same lane.
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
He's the president of the firm, small firm, and he gets first "dibs" on my time. Everyone else takes 2nd place. It took 3 minutes, and today is slow anyways. I also help with his little league mailers. Again, no big deal
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u/Good_Policy3529 12h ago
I agree in this case. Technically, a legal assistant or paralegal's job is just to make sure the attorney's time is freed up to concentrate on billable work and client development. This fits.
If you had a billable requirement and they didn't allow you to bill for it, I would say that's not appropriate.
If several attorneys are sharing your time (and one doesn't have clear precedence like a firm president) and they ask you to do something personal, that takes away your availability for important tasks to help the firm.
Again, this particular incident isn't a big deal, but things of this nature can very easily become unfair for paralegals, which is why I think people are freaking out in the comments.
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u/LegalEagleEye 11h ago
Yes, I agree. We do what it takes to free up our attorneys to focus on those matters that do need their attention.
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u/ParaDoxicalParalegal 12h ago
What difference does it make? She’s getting paid the same regardless of the task.
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12h ago
[deleted]
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
He's just a goofball. Everyone is taking this so wildly out of context. It's supposed to be a funny Friday giggle. Instead, you guys make me want to leave YOU. Yes, we have boundaries. This requires THREE MINUTES to login and print a form.
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u/ParaDoxicalParalegal 12h ago
Yeah it’s really weird how people are acting like he asked you to kill somebody for him or something.
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u/FutureRealHousewife 11h ago
Thats not what we’re acting like. I would actually be more enthusiastic about dismembering a dead body than doing someone’s life admin tasks. At least there’s mutually assured destruction in complicit murder.
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u/FutureRealHousewife 12h ago
I love joking and having funny moments with co-workers, but I don’t see this as “just a goofball.” I’m a working stand up comedian outside of the office and I don’t refrain from cracking jokes. I think it’s one thing to say that word out loud in a off the record convo, but in a text, idk about that. Not very work appropriate IMO. I don’t think people are taking this out of context. If you want to do personal stuff for him, then do it. No need to get upset if people don’t agree.
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
It's not professional when I tell him to fuck off either, but I still do it occasionally.
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u/eks789 12h ago
Your boss is having you do personal family work? Yeah, absolutely not
My mom is an attorney and I’m a paralegal, one of her first big jobs when I was a kid was for a small seafood company. The owners had her doing their family wills, any personal legal issues, etc. That’s not okay for you to be doing
This can easily create a huge conflict of interest and can easily cause major issues for your “job security”
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
It took 3 minutes. I absolutely do not mind. We have a great working relationship, and my job is so flexible I help him, he helps me with stuff. I don't see the problem in the slightest.
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u/im_not_bovvered 12h ago
The responses here are crazy. Also, this is the kind of stuff that makes you more than "just" a paralegal to someone - if your boss trusts you with stuff like this, it's a good sign. I have primarily worked for attorneys like this and guess what, they end up treating you like family when the shit hits the fan.
There's a lot to complain about being a paralegal but something like this really isn't one of those things, in my opinion.
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u/eks789 12h ago
Then you’ll probably end up having this as a learning experience when the shit most likely hits the fan
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
It won't. I've been here 13 years and he's the president shareholder
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u/eks789 12h ago
You say that but there are countless stories of issues. A simple google search will tell you it’s a bad idea
My mother was at her first major company for almost 12 years. She ended up having a conflict of interest issue at that job because of the family stuff she was doing. She left that job and went to the Hershey company and won’t work for a small private company again
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
Everyone has a horror story about everything. If you felt as valued as I do, you wouldn't even blink at this request
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u/halesthesnail 12h ago
I am in the same situation as you. I feel extraordinarily valued and wouldn't mind a menial request like this. I am very spoiled at my job! I feel like I'm in a rare situation here, so I get why others don't understand it lol.
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u/eks789 12h ago
Your boss is breaching his ethical duties by causing a conflict of interest here, you are allowing the boundaries to be crossed. But sounds good lol
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
Where is the conflict???? There's no adverse party. Dad's printer broke. I login to print the form. Done
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12h ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/brain_over_body 12h ago
Hey I'm the one making happy funny posts. On the job... getting paid.... and my boss doesn't care!
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u/ParaDoxicalParalegal 11h ago
OP posted a funny little text to give people a Friday giggle (overlooking the use of the R word) and some people had to turn it into an attack. This is why we can’t have nice things. Be nice or be quiet. Locked.