Corporate paralegals must have an attention to detail and stringent organizational skills to thrive in their careers. They also need excellent communication skills and an inherent ability to simplify complex legal jargon for corporate managers, directors, and shareholders to comprehend.
Since paralegals spend most of their days conducting research for cases, tracking deadlines, managing schedules, and filing minute book records, great organizational and communication skills are the bedrock of how paralegals build sustainable careers. Additionally, they need the right tools to manage expectations and monitor all important records.
Why entity management software is a paralegal’s best friend
Among the most helpful resources for corporate paralegals are entity management solutions. Entity management software is an intuitive, cloud-based platform that simplifies how legal teams manage large amounts of data for various legal entities.
As a corporate paralegal, managing all the legal entity affairs for the parent company is a taxing challenge in itself. If the entity has multiple subsidiaries under its corporate umbrella, it becomes significantly more difficult to remain organized, responsive, and transparent with all the people involved in managing those corporate affairs.
Entity management software automates many clerical tasks with time-efficient workflows. This is the best way to maintain those coveted organizational skills as you manage multiple entities and subsidiaries. Additionally, by automating most of the clerical work, you have more time to address any questions or concerns about minute book records from corporate executive teams.
How entity management software supports paralegal skills
Organizational and communication skills are critical components of a successful paralegal’s career. Now, let’s break down some of the tactical competencies of a paralegal’s day to day activity and how entity management software helps paralegals conduct themselves.
Managing documentation for mergers and acquisitions
Suppose the business entity your paralegals represent is undergoing an acquisition of a separate entity. Think about all the steps involved in an acquisition process:
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Researching the entity in question
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Contacting executives of that entity
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Making introductions with your own executive team
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Submitting an offer to the financial and legal heads of the entity
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Conducting due diligence into the entity’s financial history
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Preparing the documents that legalize the note of acquisition
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Preparing the documents that finalize the acquisition deal
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Submitting all the paperwork with regulators
It’s a lot of work, and it requires managing time with a lot of different stakeholders. Entity management software allows your paralegals to maintain diligent and digitized records that monitor each step of the process. Your paralegals use the platform to track important filing dates for each stage of the process, keeping an organized checklist of signatory approvals necessary to complete those files. They can then note the record on the platform so the process can continue.
Maintaining accurate records to support corporate governance
Here’s another hypothetical scenario. Suppose your company has received a summons from federal regulators to conduct an audit. Your legal department is tasked with leading the coordination with the regulators to keep the business out of any legal quandaries.
Entity management software is one of the best resources to maintain accurate and diligent records of all corporate transactions. Every time a purchase is made, an acquisition is conducted, or a shareholder invests new capital into the entity, it can all be recorded within the platform to promote proper corporate governance.
The consequences of failing to comply with corporate governance policies can potentially bankrupt your business entity. Look no further than the FTX case that forced the company into insolvency and resulted in criminal charges against the founder as he awaits trial.
Corporate governance ensures your entity is prepared for any regulatory inquiries or investigations. Your paralegals use entity management software to maintain accurate minute book records, and they can assist your in-house counsel with communicating the details of those records to the regulators at the appropriate times.
Protecting confidential entity information with advanced security measures
Any corporate documentation is extremely sensitive and confidential. It requires paralegals to maintain rigid organizational standards to protect the contents of those records.
The problem with traditional methods of corporate recordkeeping is that paper files are so easy to lose or misplace. Suppose a record with a signature from a corporate manager is lost in cluttered office spaces, negating the authorization applied to the record in question. What kind of setback does that create for the company as a whole?
Additionally, this process is very tedious and time consuming. On average, it takes paralegals up to five minutes to sort, tag, file, and organize a single page in a minute book record. Each minute book contains numerous pages, and there are likely multiple minute books in any standard office filing cabinet. Multiply all those records by the number of pages stored within, and you can see how much of your paralegal’s time is spent organizing paperwork in unsecure ways.
Entity management software is backed by biometric and hardware key authentication. This ensures that only those who have been given specific access to the platform can view the records. It protects the security of your business entity, an important step in the road towards corporate compliance and good governance.