In her own words: Dawn Gore

In the latest in our series of interviews with CILEX members, we spoke to Dawn Gore, associate at Trethowans and one of CILEX’s first Chartered Paralegals, about her career in family law and what the new status means to her

I left school at 16 with the intention of going to secretarial college but unbeknownst to me my Mum had already arranged a job interview for me at a local manufacturing company. I got the job and stayed there for four years before deciding it was time to move on.

I hadn’t considered the legal sector before but I spotted a role I liked the sound of at Trethowans, a law firm with offices near where I lived in Hampshire. I went for it and started out as a junior secretary working across multiple departments.

A few years later, I moved into the family law practice. When a new head of department joined, I started working for him and my role expanded beyond the usual secretarial work. I was preparing statements and doing clerking work at court. Fortunately for me, he was very forward thinking and encouraged me to study for a paralegal diploma with Central Law Training in 1999.

I passed the next year and was almost immediately handed a private children law caseload. A colleague had recently left, so it was all hands on deck. That was 25 years ago and I have been advising on child arrangement disputes between divorcing or separating parents ever since.

Helping families to move on

I’m now a standalone fee-earner and in 2020 was the first paralegal at the firm to be made an associate. In the last financial year, I achieved more than £260,000 in fees for the firm.

“I want the children to have the best possible childhood and not be caught up in arguments, mistrust and animosity.”

I enjoy resolving disputes. The family may not be together anymore but I want to see them able to move on. I want the children to have the best possible childhood and not be caught up in arguments, mistrust and animosity. I get a lot of satisfaction from helping clients at such a difficult time in their lives.

In recent years, working on children cases has got harder. There are huge delays in the family courts system and increasing numbers of parents are litigants in person who don’t have legal representation to help them navigate the process. It can sometimes be challenging when only one parent is legally represented.

Clients often think we can wave a magic wand and sort everything out for them, so there’s a lot of expectation management going on. It can be emotionally challenging work but I’ve been fortunate in that, most of the time, I am able to leave it at the door when I finish for the day.

Building a reputation

In 2007, I studied for the ILEx (as CILEX was then) certificate in family law and practice, passing with distinction. I later joined the Institute of Paralegals and entered the inaugural National Paralegal Awards in 2019, winning the best family law paralegal award two years running.

The paralegal role has really changed since I started working in the 1980s. It used to be just about assisting solicitors, but now it’s far more than that. Certainly, my firm has been very supportive of people like me who didn’t go to university but have built up significant knowledge and experience in their field of law.

There had been times when I considered studying to become a lawyer but I had a young family and would have struggled to fit it in. I was enjoying the job, I was progressing my career and was becoming well known for my work in children cases. It just felt like there was no need to study other areas of law when I had already decided to specialise in one aspect.

I have continued to build a strong reputation in my field and am regularly recommended to clients by other professionals including solicitors, barristers and judges. I have even represented some of them following their own divorces.

CILEX Chartered Paralegal

Not long after CILEX took over the Institute of Paralegals, they started talking about offering Chartered Paralegal status. I felt that being a CILEX Chartered Paralegal would really set me apart and give additional confidence and comfort to my clients that I had the knowledge, experience and expertise to deal with the most challenging cases.

When I heard about the pilot, I was keen to take part. The application process took time and was quite daunting, especially as I hadn’t done anything like that before. You need to provide evidence of your skills and experience and that meant digging down into the work I do, as well as being able to talk about it at the interview stage.

My advice would be that, if you think you are likely to apply for Chartered status in the future, keep a note of the cases you have worked on, the challenges you faced and how they were overcome. I was fortunate that I had a lot of reported cases, which helped me gather evidence together, but it can be hard to think back and come up with examples if you don’t have them at hand.

I have already recommended Chartered Paralegal status to my colleagues who have the right experience. It’s really worth going the extra mile to get that recognition.

Supporting paralegals in their careers is really important to me. I’ve mentored one of our paralegals through the CILEX Paralegal qualification and I would like to continue to help paralegals and support staff to progress in their careers. I benefitted from managers who encouraged me, so I know what a difference it can make.