The team you need. Sized to your caseload.
Dedicated fractional staffing for law firms — paralegal, administrative, and executive assistant support assigned to your account, acting as your own employees. Scale hours up or down each month based on your caseload, and pay only a fraction of a full salary. From $980/month.
Dedicated to your account·Scale hours monthly·Billed in 1/6th-hour increments·No long-term contract
Substance, handled.
Document drafting, review, case management, trial prep, and legal research from a dedicated paralegal — full-time, on-site Chicago professionals who appear in person for court runs and trial.
Paralegal SupportThe back office, off your desk.
Court runs, Clerk's office and Vital Records trips, copying, mail, and marketing execution — one on-site Amata team member handling the work that keeps a firm moving.
Administrative SupportA right hand, on retainer.
Calendar, inbox, travel, intake, and client coordination from a dedicated, long-term executive assistant who acts on your behalf — as part of your team.
Executive Assistant SupportMake your support staff a revenue line — not an overhead expense.
What is fractional staffing?
Fractional staffing is a model where a law firm hires dedicated paralegal, administrative, or executive-assistant support for a set number of hours each month — instead of a full-time employee. The staff member is assigned to your account and works as your own employee would, but you pay only a fraction of a full salary and can scale hours up or down as your caseload changes.
A solo or small firm rarely needs a full-time paralegal and a full-time administrator — but it absolutely needs the work they do. Fractional staffing solves the mismatch: dedicated, professional-grade support sized to your actual caseload, billed by the hour instead of carried as salary, benefits, and turnover risk on the books. Your staff is dedicated to your account — the same person each month, learning your cases, systems, and preferences — with detailed accounting of every task completed.
Fractional staffing vs. a full-time hire vs. a temp agency.
Most attorneys have only ever weighed two options: hire someone full-time, or call a temp agency when they're underwater. Fractional staffing is a third model — a dedicated professional assigned to your firm for a set number of hours a month, at a fraction of a full salary.
| Full-time hire | Temp / contract agency | Fractional staffing (Amata) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who they work for | Your firm, full-time | Whoever the agency assigns; rotates | A dedicated professional assigned to your firm |
| Consistency | The same person | Different people, little continuity | The same person every month, learning your cases |
| Cost structure | Full salary + benefits + overhead | Hourly markup, often a premium | A fraction of a full salary; pay for hours used |
| Commitment | Long-term employment | Per assignment | Month-to-month terms — scale up or down — but a long-term relationship; your dedicated Amata employee stays with your firm for the long haul |
| Ramp-up | Weeks of hiring and onboarding | Re-training with each new temp | No hiring or onboarding — your support is an already-trained Amata team member, oriented to your practice as they come on |
| When demand drops | You still pay the full salary | End the assignment | Scale your hours down |
| Best for | Firms that can fill 40 hrs/week | One-off coverage gaps | Solo & small firms needing dedicated support sized to caseload |
In short: a full-time hire gives you dedication but makes you pay for 40 hours whether you fill them or not. A temp agency gives you flexibility but no continuity. Fractional staffing gives you both — the same dedicated person, sized to the hours you actually need.
What is admin work really costing you?
Type in your own numbers — your opportunity cost updates as you go. No email required. The numbers are yours.
Four programs — plus a custom option built around your practice.
Three core staffing programs cover most firms. The fourth pairs administrative support with Amata's Marketing Lab. And if your practice doesn't fit neatly into a category, we'll build a program around exactly what you need. On any monthly program, your team member works under your firm's email address — as part of your team.
- Court runs in Chicago, Clerk's office & Vital Records trips
- Copying, scanning, mail preparation, courtesy copies to judges
- Social media management & digital ad campaign support
- Paid media coordination & Google LSA management
- Weekly opportunity tracking & GA4 channel reporting
- Monthly report — work completed, hours spent, outcomes delivered
- Full executive-assistant service, dedicated to your account
- Email management & appointment setting
- Event scheduling & client intake
- Social media management
- Any other task an executive assistant would perform
- Monthly report — work completed, hours spent, outcomes delivered
- Document drafting & document review
- Case management & e-filing
- Trial preparation
- Legal research
- Any other task a paralegal would perform, dedicated to your practice
- Monthly report sortable by day, type of work & matter
Custom Program — your hours, your terms
Your practice doesn't fit neatly into a category? We'll build a program around exactly what you need. No package is too small or too specific.
Admin-20 & Marketing Lab Plus.
The fourth program turns your administrative support into a marketing engine. Admin-20 executes the foundation on a consistent weekly rhythm; Marketing Lab Plus adds a dedicated slice of Amata's marketing team — paid-ad management and thought-leadership content drafted in your voice.
Admin-20 & Marketing Lab Plus
One assigned administrator every month, executing the six-pillar marketing foundation on a consistent weekly rhythm. Marketing Lab Plus layers on Google Ads management, Google LSA management, and substantive content drafted in your voice. Monthly report delivered by the 5th business day.
Campaign structure, daily monitoring, optimization, and ad-copy testing.
Local Service Ads profile maintenance, lead response, and dispute management.
A 1,200+ word thought-leadership article, social posts, and GBP posts — drafted in your voice.
Quarterly content calendar, negative-review drafting, and technical SEO interpretation.
Paid ad-media budget is billed separately to Google. Month-to-month — no contract. The Marketing Lab pairs only with Admin-20 or EA-30 (not Paralegal-40).
Prefer to use support by the hour?
No program, no commitment — draw on Amata's paralegal and administrative team as you need them, billed in 1/6th-hour increments.
Document drafting, case management, trial prep, e-filing.
Explore Paralegal Support →Court runs, mail, copying, scanning, clerk filings.
Explore Admin Support →You bring the practice. Amata brings the team.
A fully-loaded full-time paralegal and administrator in Illinois costs more than $150,000 a year in combined salary, benefits, and overhead — before you account for hiring, management, and turnover.2 Amata's fractional programs deliver the same dedicated, professional-grade support sized to your caseload, with no payroll, no benefits, and no turnover risk — typically more than 60% less than a full-time hire.
The math is even simpler at the hourly level. The average lawyer's billable rate is $349 an hour1 — so every hour you spend on a clerk's-office run, scheduling, or document prep is $349 of work you didn't bill. Amata administrative support is $70 an hour. Recover even a few billable hours a week and the program pays for itself many times over.
Schedule a Free ConsultationPrograms include a 32% discount on all hourly rates. Scale up or down monthly — no long-term contract.
Explore the ProgramsCommon questions about fractional staffing.
Answers about Amata's fractional paralegal, admin, and executive assistant programs for Chicago law firms.
Ask Us DirectlyFractional staffing is a model where a firm hires dedicated paralegal, administrative, or executive-assistant support for a set number of hours each month instead of a full-time employee. The staff member is assigned to your account, works as your own employee would, and you pay only a fraction of a full salary — scaling hours up or down as your caseload changes.
A temp or contract agency sends whoever is available, and the person often rotates from one assignment to the next. Fractional staffing assigns you a dedicated professional who works only your account — the same person each month, trained on your practice and building institutional knowledge — for a set number of hours at a fraction of a full salary.
Admin-20 (20 hrs, $980) covers on-site and virtual administrative work plus marketing execution. EA-30 (30 hrs, $1,650) is full executive-assistant service — email, scheduling, intake, and more. Paralegal-40 (40 hrs, $2,520) is substantive legal support: drafting, review, case management, trial prep, and research. Each is dedicated to your account.
Marketing Lab Plus adds about 8.5 marketing-team hours a month on top of the Admin-20 foundation: Google Ads management (2.5 hrs), Google LSA management (1.5 hrs), substantive content drafting including a 1,200+ word article in your voice (2.5 hrs), and strategy and reactive work like the quarterly content calendar and review responses (2.0 hrs).
Your fractional staff member is dedicated to your account — the same person each month, learning your cases, systems, and preferences, and acting as your own employee would. You receive detailed accounting of all work completed.
Programs are billed at a flat monthly rate for a set number of hours. Hourly pay-as-you-go support is billed in 1/6th-hour increments — $90/hr for paralegal work, $70/hr for administrative work. Hours don't roll over, and overages are invoiced at your plan's rate.
Yes. You can adjust your program at any time as your caseload changes — scale up for a trial, scale back when it settles. Need a configuration that doesn't fit the standard programs? The Custom program is built around exactly what your practice needs.
A fully-loaded full-time paralegal and administrator in Illinois costs more than $150,000 a year in salary, benefits, and overhead. Amata's fractional programs deliver dedicated support sized to your caseload for a fraction of that — typically a savings of more than 60%, with no payroll or turnover risk.
Amata serves attorneys and professional service organizations across Chicagoland — solo firms that need senior-level support without a full-time hire, growing firms that need to scale support with caseload, and Big Law departures rebuilding lean. Amata has supported Chicago's legal and professional community for 24+ years.
No — hours don't roll over into the next month, and all overages are invoiced at the rate of the plan purchased for the month the overage occurred. If you consistently need more hours, contact us and we'll adjust your program at any time.
The team you need.
Without the payroll.
Tell us about your practice and your caseload, and we'll match you with the right program — or build a custom one. No long-term contract, and you can scale up or down as you go.
Ready to get started? Fill out our client intake form and an Amata team member will follow up to match you with the right program.
Start the Client Intake FormSources: 1. Clio Legal Trends Report (lawyer utilization rate and average billable rate). 2. Amata estimate of the fully-loaded annual cost (salary, benefits, taxes, and overhead) of a full-time paralegal plus administrator in Illinois; consistent with BLS and market salary data. Individual firm results vary. 3. Small-law-firm industry surveys (Thomson Reuters State of U.S. Small Law Firms; Embroker). 4. Analysis of Clio Legal Trends utilization data comparing solo firms to firms with 20+ employees; revenue gap is illustrative and varies by rate and practice.