If you’re considering a career in legal support work, don’t underestimate the power of soft skills. While mastering hard skills like legal procedures, forms, and software is important, soft skills are often the differentiator between someone who just “does the job” and someone who excels, earns trust, and builds a long-term, fulfilling career.

Skills like communication, organization, and time management help you handle complex cases, support clients, liaise with attorneys, and ensure that no deadline or detail slips through the cracks.

In this post, we explore why soft skills matter so much in legal careers and which ones you need to develop to thrive in this demanding field.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Why Soft Skills Matter in the Legal Profession
• Essential Soft Skills for Legal Professionals
• How to Develop Legal Soft Skills Through Training

WHY SOFT SKILLS MATTER IN THE LEGAL PROFESSION

If you want to be an effective legal support professional, understanding legal terminology and court procedures is critical. But such technical know-how often isn’t enough. Soft skills—how you communicate, how you think, how you treat people—are the real magic.

That’s because clients aren’t just files or case numbers. They’re people with anxieties, hopes, and vulnerabilities. Legal professionals who can combine precise legal knowledge with compassion, clarity, and good judgment are far more effective in guiding clients through often confusing and emotional processes.

Plus, soft skills directly impact client trust and communication. As a legal assistant or immigration case manager, you may be the primary point of contact for clients. You’ll answer their calls, explain processes, set expectations, and relay updates. Your ability to communicate clearly, listen attentively, and adapt your tone to the client’s needs can make or break a client’s experience.

In short, while hard skills may get you hired, it’s soft skills that help you build relationships and become indispensable to clients and teams.

Interpersonal skills will take you far in the legal field

ESSENTIAL SOFT SKILLS FOR LEGAL PROFESSIONALS

Below are the soft skills that make the difference between being a good legal support professional and a great one.

Communication and Listening

Legal support staff routinely draft correspondence, relay information between attorneys and clients, and explain complex procedures to people with no legal background. Having strong written and verbal communication skills ensures that your messages are clear and accurate.

Active listening is arguably even more important. Legal professionals must listen not just to respond, but to understand. When interviewing a new client, you need to listen carefully to the client’s emotional story to extract the relevant facts needed for the file.

Imagine you work as an immigration case manager and you need to explain a complex list of required forms to a client whose first language is not English. You must avoid confusing legal jargon, use plain language, and verify the client understands exactly what is needed by a specific deadline.

Prioritization and Attention to Detail

A missing signature, a wrong date, a misplaced document—any small error can cause delays or other problems. You need to be able to juggle competing priorities and still produce accurate work.

“The most challenging part was learning to prioritize—that is, learning to understand what could wait and what couldn’t wait when everything feels like it needs to happen right now,” says Herzing grad Cheryl Michaud, who has more than 20 years of experience in legal support.

“There’s a lot of pressure to complete a task quickly, but the reality is that these things take time to do and often require a very high level of attention to detail. Learning to cope with the pressure and maintain a high attention to detail and accuracy in what you’re working on is very important.”

Organization and Time Management

The legal field runs on strict deadlines. Missing a court filing date can have catastrophic consequences.

Say you’re a legal assistant in a small litigation firm. On Monday morning, you notice one case needs documents by mid-week, another client needs a status update, and a third file needs court forms filed before Friday.

So what do you do?

• Open a prioritized task list, assign deadlines, and break big tasks into smaller steps.
• Create a calendar with reminders: follow-up calls, submission deadlines, client appointments, and file reviews
• Ensure each client file is organized, with digital folders properly named, hard-copy files clearly labelled, and documents scanned and backed up.

Because of your efforts, deadlines are met, clients receive timely updates, and attorneys can rely on you.

Legal support professionals need top-notch organizational skills

Critical Thinking and Problem Solving

Legal support roles require constant evaluation of information. While legal assistants and immigration case managers cannot give legal advice, they must use critical thinking to support the lawyer’s work.

Suppose you’re working on an immigration case. The client provided some documents, but there are gaps. Perhaps a key form is missing, or a supporting document doesn’t meet agency requirements. If you just pass the documents on to the attorney without scrutiny, the case might get delayed or rejected.

Instead, you review, notice the missing form, flag it, and prepare a list of follow-up actions for the client. You might request additional evidence and document your reasoning clearly.

This kind of analytical thinking and foresight helps avoid wasted time, reduces risk, and improves the firm’s chances of success.

Empathy and Emotional Intelligence

The ability to understand and respond appropriately to others’ emotions is particularly crucial in legal work. Clients come to legal offices during some of their worst days, and how you respond to their emotional state significantly impacts their experience.

Let’s say you’re dealing with a family law client who is furious about a custody arrangement. Empathy doesn’t mean agreeing with them or becoming their therapist. It means recognizing when someone is anxious and knowing how to provide reassurance without making promises you can’t keep. Thus, you validate their frustration professionally (“I understand this is incredibly stressful and frustrating for you”) while steering them back to the necessary legal steps.

High emotional intelligence also means sensing when your supervising lawyer is under immense deadline pressure and perhaps postponing non-urgent questions until a better time.

Professionalism and Teamwork

Legal work is rarely a solo endeavour. Even in small practices, you’ll work closely with attorneys, other support staff, and external contacts like court clerks and opposing counsel. Success depends on how well you function as part of a team.

Alisen Kotyk is a Herzing legal assistant grad who went on to become a full-fledged lawyer. Her top piece of advice for aspiring legal assistants is to be willing to help with whatever needs doing.

“The other day, I approached an assistant about something they have a lot of experience with and asked if I could meet with them after the staff lunch. And their response was, ‘I’m working from home today.’ Period. Not ‘But I’ll be in tomorrow and are you free at 2:00?’ or something like that,” she told us.

“Don’t just end the conversation. By being that person who gives the ‘yes, however’ answers instead of the ‘no’ answers, you’re going to succeed over your peers that are not doing that. A ‘yes, however’ legal assistant is going to build a great reputation for themselves as being invaluable to their lawyer or firm. That attitude stands out.”

HOW TO DEVELOP LEGAL SOFT SKILLS THROUGH TRAINING

You can’t learn soft skills just by reading a textbook. A quality training program will help you cultivate these abilities through practical application.

For instance, students might engage in mock client intake interviews where they are graded not just on gathering the correct information, but on their tone, active listening, and ability to handle difficult questions without overstepping ethical boundaries. Writing assignments might focus on drafting professional emails to clients or memos to supervising lawyers, emphasizing clarity, brevity, and appropriate tone.

However, the most significant development of soft skills happens during the internship. This is where the rubber meets the road.

An internship plunges you into the daily reality of a law office. You may learn how to manage the pressure of real deadlines, navigate office politics, and interact with actual clients under the supervision of experienced mentors. That kind of experiential learning is invaluable.

DEVELOP THE SKILLS YOU NEED FOR A LEGAL SUPPORT CAREER

Herzing College offers two legal studies diploma programs: legal assistant and immigration case manager. Both programs are delivered online, take just nine months to complete, and include an internship for real work experience.

Click below to learn more about each program and chat live with an admissions advisor. We’re here to help!