Legal Researcher Resume Example & Writing Guide
Use this Legal Researcher resume example and guide to improve your career and write a powerful resume that will separate you from the competition.
Legal researchers are an integral part of the law firm or corporate legal department. They’re tasked with finding information related to specific cases or projects so that attorneys can make informed decisions about their work.
Legal researchers might work directly with attorneys on their cases or with paralegals on larger projects with multiple components. Either way, they need to be highly organized and efficient at finding information quickly.
Here are some tips and an example to help you write a compelling legal researcher resume that will land you interviews with top firms.
How to Write a Legal Researcher Resume
Here’s how to write a resume of your own.
Write Compelling Bullet Points
Bullet points are the most effective way to showcase your experience and qualifications. And when it comes to legal research, you can use bullet points to describe the type of research you conducted, the type of information you found, and the type of organization or company you worked for.
For example, rather than saying you “conducted legal research,” you could say you “conducted legal research for a major pharmaceutical company to identify potential patent infringement by competitors.”
The second bullet point is much more specific and tells the reader not only what you did but also the outcome of your work.
Identify and Include Relevant Keywords
When you submit your resume for a legal researcher role, it’s likely that it will be scanned by an applicant tracking system (ATS) for certain keywords. These programs look for specific terms related to the job, like “evidence” or “legal research,” in order to determine whether your skills are a match. If your resume doesn’t include enough of the right terms, the ATS might filter out your application.
To increase your chances of getting an interview, make sure to include relevant keywords throughout all sections of your resume. You can find a list of common legal researcher keywords below:
- Legal Research
- Legal Writing
- Litigation
- Legal Advice
- Corporate Law
- Civil Litigation
- Legal Document Preparation
- Westlaw
- Intellectual Property
- Labor and Employment Law
- Appeals
- Legal Contract Review
- Commercial Litigation
- Legal Consulting
- Document Drafting
- Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A)
- Trials
- Criminal Law
- LexisNexis
- Trial Practice
- Document Review
- Research
- Document Review Services
- Document Drafting
- Due Diligence
- Document Preparation
- Corporate Governance
- Public Speaking
- Microsoft Access
- Family Law
Showcase Your Technical Skills
As a legal researcher, you will be expected to be proficient in the use of legal research databases, such as LexisNexis and Westlaw. You should also have experience with using a variety of software programs, such as Microsoft Office Suite and Adobe Acrobat. Additionally, it is helpful to be familiar with legal case management software, as this can be used to keep track of deadlines and progress on cases.