Interview with Mary Jo Kuen Mary Jo Kuen, works for the Dodge County Judicial System, she actually holds three positions at her job. She is the Judicial Assistant to Branch 2, Deputy Register in Probate and Judicial Receptionist. Mary has achieved these positions with only a High School Diploma and a few night classes at Moraine Park Technical College; she has no formal college training for her profession, nor is continuing her education at this time however she is very highly respected by all whom she works with. Mary Jo has been a Legal Office Professional for 31 years. I spoke with Mary Jo over the phone and via email to ask some questions about her professional career, and what I have to look forward to getting into this field.

Mary Jo’s responsibilities vary as she holds more than one position and it all depends on what she is doing that day. As Judicial Assistant, it is her job to do all the scheduling for her Courtroom; she does all correspondence, orders and any other paper necessary for each Branch 2 file. As Deputy Register in Probate, she files all Probate, Guardianships, Adoptions and Mental cases in the absence of the Register in Probate. She is also the only Judicial Assistant that clerks all of the Probate, Guardianship and Adoption court hearings in all four branches. She is also in charge of docketing the voluminous amount of paperwork that comes in. As Judicial Receptionist, she basically makes sure everybody knows where they are going and gets them to the right courtroom on time. Mary Jo reports directly to Judge Storck in most cases, her only other supervisor is the Register in Probate when Mary Jo takes over her duties when she is out of the office. Judge Storck, Mary Jo’s boss is also the Chief Judge of the Judges in Dodge County so that means he has extra duties such as budget preparation, so this means that Mary Jo gets to type all of the additional things that his position requires. Mary Jo has various meetings and she also is required to take minutes for those meetings. Mary Jo only makes between $42,000 and $45,000 annually, and in asking Mary Jo if she does anything else outside of her actual job description she said the only other thing she does is dishes.

       Knowing that Mary Jo works for the Dodge County Courthouse I asked her how many people are in her team. She stated that she was not sure what I meant by “team” but that she works at the front office on the second floor as Judicial Receptionist and the only other person in her office is the Register in Probate. She explained that there are five court branches in the Dodge County Courthouse with four being circuit court branches and Branch 5 being the Family Court Commissioner’s Courtroom. All four of the Judicial Assistants work closely together and cover for each other for vacations and other things when the need arises. She stated that all of the Judicial Assistants work closely with the people in the Clerk of Courts Office, since that is where all of their files that they need are held.

I was curious if every ones job description in the team she works with were the same. She told me that all of their job descriptions are all the same, but their main job is keeping the calendar for their respective branches scheduled and in full working order. They all have a few different tasks that each of their judges requires them to do such as: Branch 1 & 4 has videoconferencing capabilities so those Judicial Assistants are responsible for setting up the videoconferences. Branch 1’s judge is needier with his calendar so his assistant is in the courtroom scheduling more than most of them. Branch 3’s Judicial Assistant gives out and keeps track of all the Guardian ad Litem’s appointments for all four branches. Branch 4’s Judicial Assistant has a lot of Excel, and Microsoft Office Word experience so that is their “technical go-to” person that all of the Judicial Assistants go to when they need spreadsheets or charts prepared.

In being unsure of whether I want to go into the private sector or work for a Court house myself; I also asked Mary Jo whether she preferred working for the Dodge County Courthouse or the private sector. She stated that, both have their pros and cons. working for the County, she pretty much knows that her hours are set from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and there is no negotiating for her wages. She stated that she believes working conditions are better for the County as they have stricter codes as far as harassment and fewer deadlines since she is on the filing end of cases, and in her experience the County can offer a much better benefit package. She said that working in private practice can be challenging depending highly on your boss, and you will find in private practice you have stricter deadlines to meet as far as filing requirements. She said that in her time in private practice she did what she had to do to meet those deadlines and sometimes it required her to work until 8 or 9 p.m., and sometimes there were days she had to be to the office at 6:00 a.m. Although, she did state that in a private practice you do have more flexibility with hours and wages and can get paid based on your “output”. She also stated that private practice can offer a few pluses such as bonuses, and extra perks such as an hour lunch hour, and they may even buy you lunch and give you Christmas and birthday gifts whereas the County does not do these things. She did say that she made more working in private practice than she does for the county, but she also didn't have the benefits such as health insurance, 401K Plan, sick days. So, it is really all in what’s important to you good pay or good benefits.

Now that Mary Jo works for Dodge County Courthouse she has a pretty set schedule, she only works 40 hours a week, and this only varies if she is clerking a jury trial which happens only two to three times a year. She also receives vacation time, which she says varies depending on how long you have been at the court house. For the first six years you work at the County you receive two weeks’ vacation. After working there for seven to thirteen years you receive 3 weeks’ vacation, and after fourteen years you receive four weeks’ vacation. She also does not receive any personal days however; she does receive one sick day a month and they accumulate if they are not used.

I was curious on if there was anything Mary Jo did not like about her job after hearing so many positive things, upon asking her this she responded “I pretty much love everything about my job, but my goal would be to obtain a job that you get paid according to your performance.” In closing our interview I asked Mary Jo what was the best advice she could give me to be successful as a Legal Office Administrator. All she had to say was “Accuracy, accuracy, accuracy, having an outgoing personality and knowing how to handle different personalities.” After talking with Mary Jo and emailing her I can only hope that I am one day just as good as a Legal Office Administrator or Judicial Assistant as she is. In speaking with people in the Dodge County Clerk of Courts Office about my ambitions and the fact that I interviewed Mary Jo there wasn’t one person who had a ill word to say about her they all seemed to respect her greatly, as she has earned and set a very high reputation for anyone entering her field.

By: Catherine Smith