Advocates are responsible for speaking on behalf of someone else. They use their legal training to represent other individuals in legal settings such as hearings and courtrooms. These professionals offer advice and proper guidelines to persons who are not familiar with the legal system. They may work on different cases including health care system negotiations, divorces, crimes, among other lawsuits. Professionals performing their duties in child and family services meet with families and children to gather information, inform them about their responsibilities and rights, and then these specialists report back to staff members and judges.

Advocates usually perform many of the following tasks:
•   Giving advice about legal matters.
•   Guiding witnesses to give their evidence.
•   Sorting out public enquiries.
• Speaking on behalf of their clients.
•   Creating reports.

• Being able to perform different tasks at the same time.
• Having interpersonal skills.
• Being able to work with people from different backgrounds.
• Having good listening skills.
• Being able to work independently.
• Having organizational skills.
• Being reliable.
• Having IT skills.
• Being detail-oriented.
• Having problem solving skills.

Candidates for Advocate job placements are required to have a Bachelor´s Degree related to the law field, relevant experience in this area, or a combination of experience and education. Other way to enter to this sector is having one year of vocational training in order to have suitable knowledge and skills for future jobs. Several professionals of this field started working as volunteers in government agencies, county libraries, or other institutions. Those who want to perform their duties as Family Advocates must be graduates of psychology programs and then take courses and workshops to obtain a certification.