A National Institute for Trial Lawyers
Illuminating Advocates.
Transforming Justice.
"The practice of law asks more of us than knowledge."
It asks us to stand in uncertainty, to listen before we speak, and to see the human being before the case. Ethos Advocacy Institute develops advocates of character, clarity, and courage who illuminate the truth and transform justice.
Who Ethos Serves
Training for Lawyers Who Represent People
Ethos Advocacy Institute provides training for lawyers who represent people—advocates whose work centers on representing individuals and protecting their interests in the legal system.
Ethos programs are not open to prosecutors or insurance defense lawyers. This limitation is intentional: it allows participants to work candidly and learn within a community whose professional responsibilities are aligned.
How Ethos Began
It Began as an Experiment
In 2017, trial lawyer Rick Friedman gathered 40 lawyers around a question traditional legal education rarely addressed: What happens when the greatest obstacles to our advocacy are not gaps in legal knowledge, but the pressures, fears, habits, and conflicts we carry into the work ourselves?
The experiment worked. The lawyers asked for more, and Ethos Advocacy Institute was born.
Today, the experiment continues. Ethos brings lawyers together to develop not only what they know and what they do, but who they are when the stakes are high.
The Ethos Approach
Learn. Experience. Practice. Integrate.
Learn
Substantive teaching that allows advocates to discover principles for themselves.
Experience
You will examine cases from perspectives you may not have considered.
Practice
You will test stories rather than merely construct them, and practice under pressure.
Integrate
You will receive meaningful feedback and learn from guides, colleagues, and your own experience.
Our programs combine substantive teaching with experiential methods, because understanding something intellectually is not the same as being able to do it when it matters. At Ethos, knowledge becomes action.
An Institute Built Around Experience
What "Ethos" Means
The word ethos carries an ancient meaning: the character of the speaker, the source from which credibility arises. Excellent advocacy requires more than knowing how to persuade—it requires knowing what you stand for when persuasion becomes difficult. Some lessons cannot be learned from a podium. They must be experienced.
Ethos programs are designed around active participation: working cases, telling stories, examining witnesses, and practicing the difficult work of advocacy in a community committed to excellence.
Guides do more than demonstrate expertise. They enter the work with you.
The result is an environment in which lawyers are not merely collecting techniques. They are developing capacity.
Our Mission
We Develop Advocates of Character, Clarity, and Courage Who Illuminate the Truth and Transform Justice.
Character, because credibility begins with who we are. Clarity, because complexity is no excuse for confusion. Courage, because advocacy asks us to enter difficult places. And justice, because ultimately this work must serve something larger than ourselves.
Every courtroom contains more than a dispute. It contains human beings trying to understand what happened and what justice now requires. The advocate’s responsibility is not merely to speak. It is to help them see.
Find Your Next Ethos Program
Come Prepared to Work
Whether you are developing foundational trial skills, working on advanced advocacy, exploring story and human behavior, or seeking a community in which experienced lawyers continue challenging one another to grow, there is a place for you at Ethos.