Provided the lawyer maintains responsibility for the work product, a lawyer may delegate to a paralegal any task normally performed by the lawyer except those tasks proscribed to a nonlawyer by statute, court rule, administrative rule or regulation, controlling authority, the applicable rule of professional conduct of the jurisdiction in which the lawyer practices, or these Guidelines

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Lawyers must instruct paralegals on professional conduct rules and supervise
paralegals consistent with the rules.
To conform to Guideline 1, a lawyer must give appropriate instruction to paralegals
            
require paralegals to act in accordance with those rules. See Comment to Model Ru le 5.3;
see also N A  L A M “  G  
Utilization of Legal Assistants, Guidelines 1 and 4 (1985, revised 1990, 1997, 2005)
 NALA G
Additionally, the lawyer must directly supervise paralegals employed by the lawyer to
ensure that, in every circumstance, the paralegal is acting in a manner consistent with the
     W    
supervision will differ from one state to another and the lawyer has the obligation to ma ke
adjustments accordingly.
GUIDELINE 2: Provided the lawyer maintains responsibility for the work product, a
lawyer may delegate to a paralegal any task normally performed by the lawyer
except those tasks proscribed to a nonlawyer by statute, court rule, administrative
rule or regulation, controlling authority, the applicable rule of professional conduct
of the jurisdiction in which the lawyer practices, or these guidelines.
COMMENT
Many tasks may be delegated to Paralegals so long as they are properly supervised.
T              ABA   8
and subsequently amended in 19979 is that, so long as appropriate supervision i s
maintained, many tasks normally performed by lawyers may be delegated to paralegals. EC
   M C         
perform under appropriate lawyer supervision: factual investigation and research, legal
research, and the preparation of legal documents. Various states delineate more specific
tasks in their guidelines including attending client conferences, corresponding with and
8 The 1986 ABA   A        
training or work experience, who is employed or retained by a lawyer, law office, governmental
agency, or other entity, in a capacity or function which involves the performance, under the ultimate
direction and supervision of an attorney, of  substantive legal work, which work,
for the most part, requires a sufficient knowledge of legal concepts that, absent such assistant, the
attorney would perform the 
9 In 1997, the ABA amended the definition of legal assistant by adopting the following
 A             
experience who is employed or retained by a lawyer, law office, corporation, governmental agency or
other entity who performs specifically delegated substantive legal work for which a lawyer is


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