2. DECIDE WHERE TO APPLY

If you are interested in making a lot of money or are considering law school, we suggest that you apply for paralegal positions at major law firms -- they provide many opportunities for overtime pay and have the greatest number of openings for paralegals. In fact, because of the annual turnover, most large law firms have a standing need for paralegals, whether they have advertised job openings or not.

Unless your friends or relatives are attorneys, chances are you don't know one law firm from another. You may not even know the names of any. Trust us, you'll want to learn some quickly; you don't want to work at any ol' firm. You need to find a job at a place where you're going to be happy, which means avoiding the large crop of firms where the attorneys are lunatics.

So, how can I find law firms I might like?

We suggest that you begin your search by looking at one or both of the following two books: The Insider's Guide to Law Firms or The VaultReports.com Guide to America's Top 50 Law Firms. The Insider's Guide is offered on Amazon.com for about $45, but it really is an investment for the tons you'll make when you're hired!. All you have to do is register — for free — and you can look through complete entries on each firm. Of course, if you like the feel of a sturdy book in your job-seeking hand, you can buy either of these books for about $30.

These books provide useful statistical and contact information (e.g., total number of attorneys, starting salaries, minority representation, firm addresses, contact information for their recruiting coordinators, etc.) for many of the nation's major law firms. More importantly, they provide an evaluation of each firm. These evaluations explain things such as the firm's reputation, its high-profile cases, its culture, its political affiliations, and so on.

Look at the firms that have offices in the city/cities where you wanna work, and pick a few based upon factors that you consider most important to your stint as a paralegal. To be safe, choose ten firms. The Insider's Guide is probably the best source for this task, since it includes a greater number of firms. However, The VaultReports, which ranks firms, may be more helpful in ordering your choices - particularly if you are interested in reputation and prestige.

What about this "Martindale Hubbell" thing I've heard about?

If you don't wanna shell out the thirty bones for either book, and you don't like to register on-line for anything, you can begin your search with a less precise but less costly resource called Martindale Hubbell. "Martindale," as it is known in the biz, is a directory of every single attorney in America, organized by city and then by law firm. Yeah, it's a real page-turner -- but very useful. So go to your school or local public library, find the Martindale volume for your city, and start skimming. Read the abstracts at the top of each firm's entry, which describe the nature of each firm's work: corporate or litigation, entertainment or finance, and choose your firms, based on features that appeal to you. Remember: the larger the firm, the more likely that there are current openings for paralegals. And the more impressive your lies will be when you tell people you're actually a lawyer at the firm.

Isn't there a way I could do this on the Internet?

If using books makes you want to hurt things (heck, you don't wanna READ, you wanna paralegal) there is a terrific service on the web which will allow you to learn about firms that have advertised for paralegals. For free. Good places to start are www.monster.com and careerbuilder.com. If you go to these sites and look for paralegal openings, you'll be hit with a list of currently open positions.

If you are looking for a job with set hours and the potential to move laterally to a non-legal job, you will want to apply for paralegal positions at insurance companies, investment banks, or other private companies with in-house lawyers. Heck, even the U.S. Government needs paralegals. Go to monstertrak.com or the career resource websites mentioned above and select targets based upon your areas of interest.