Hot Legal Careers
The legal industry in America has always been profitable, and in the present-day legal community business is booming. Whether you want to commit the time to become a lawyer or you want to parley your educational and professional background to take advantage of the legal industry in some other way, there are plenty of hot legal careers to give you a comfortable living.
Intellectual Property Attorney
If you’re attending law school or want to become an attorney, intellectual property attorneys are the fastest growing attorneys today. Intellectual property governs ideas, and patents and trademarks are the bread and butter of an IP attorney’s repertoire. With booming innovation today, an intellectual property attorney can make a living dealing in patents alone.
Think about it: with advances in computer technology, bioengineering, and all of the fields that cover technology and innovation, you’ve got thousands of companies and individuals seeking to patent their money-making idea. An intellectual property attorney can make a killing managing patents – or working to dispute a patent.
How to Become an Intellectual Property Attorney
To become an intellectual property attorney, you’ll need to get your JD. It helps to have a technical background, so you have a good understanding of a field, such as chemical engineering. Patent attorneys must pass a federal bar exam.
Hot Legal Jobs for Non-Lawyers
Even if you don’t want to attend law school and deal with the specialization required to become an intellectual property attorney, there are other hot legal jobs for non-lawyers. For these jobs, you may need a minimal education, such as a certificate program, or may be able to utilize your existing education and background to make a killing in the legal field.
People in many professions can become consultants to attorneys, but there are also specialty crossover fields that provide opportunities to enter the legal industry without pursuing a lengthy legal education.
E-Discovery Professional
An e-discovery professional is someone who deals with electronic information. An e-discovery professional might be called upon to help locate, gather, and manage electronic data for litigation. E-discovery professionals typically have backgrounds in information technology or law, and combine technical skills with legal knowledge to manage electronically stored information, or ESI, in litigation.
Legal Nurse Consultant
Medical malpractice cases, as well as cases involving personal injury, involve dealing with complex medical terminology and concepts. While many lawyers learn basic medical knowledge during the course of their careers, there are times when lawyers need to consult with someone with a medical background. Legal nurse consultants can provide this medical information, and are making a ton of money serving as consultants for attorneys in this growing field.
Legal nurse consultants are licensed, registered nurses with at least five years of medical background. Registered nurses can take certificate programs or pursue legal nurse consulting coursework to parley a nursing career into a career as a legal nurse consultant.
Paralegals
Lawyers are in high demand. Between personal injury, medical malpractice, product liability, divorce, bankruptcy, and all of the things that can incite legal action, many lawyers have more work than they can manage. This is why many lawyers and law firms hire paralegals to help with the workload. Paralegals are extremely knowledgeable assistants who can handle many legal tasks, such as drafting legal documents, communicating with clients, and managing files and documentation. Paralegals have been ranked among the 20 hottest jobs, and the demand is growing.
Paralegals are non-lawyers who are trained in the basics of law, typically in a certificate program. A good paralegal is an extremely well-organized individual with good interpersonal skills for managing client relationships.