Table 4 Outcomes from resident and faculty feedback on the 2021–2022 mentorship families program

Benefits

Encouraging connections between residents

The Mentorship Families Program encouraged connections between residency years.

“Good to connect with other coresidents.” ID24

“Ways to connect residents from different classes who might not normally spend time with one another, allow residents to give and get advice about different rotations and strategies for success, discuss strategies for completing scholarly work and balancing with clinical responsibilities.” ID11

“Camaraderie-building, additional avenue for support.” ID16

“Connected to residents of different years that may otherwise not have connected with at all.” ID27

“Connecting with a group that is diverse in their experiences and resident year.” ID29

Fostering connections between residents and faculty

The Mentorship Families Program fostered relationship-building between residents and faculty.

“Fostering a closer, more personal bond with faculty and providing an additional point-of-contact in the program for resources, questions, or anything else.” ID27

“Getting to know some residents better.” ID28

“Great to have a designated contact person from the beginning.” ID5

“Good opportunity to meet residents at an early stage in their careers.” ID02

Providing career advice

The Mentorship Families Program fostered an environment to receive helpful career advice while community building across residency years.

“Informal space to get honest career advice, create a sense of community.” ID12

“Excellent opportunity for residents to have more guidance.” ID20

“It was helpful to see what career advice questions residents had in different years of the program, so that I could have a sense of the longer-term trajectory.” ID23

“I really enjoyed getting to know residents, their concerns and passions, and helping them navigate post-pandemic uncertainty, as well as better understand the job landscape.” ID22

Areas of Improvement

Scheduling difficulties

Logistical difficulties with scheduling meeting times was a challenge.

“Difficulty has been finding days in which everyone has been able to meet.” ID32

“Difficult to coordinate meetings and ultimately couldn’t even engage with the PGY1 who was rotating on different services.” ID02

“Large and unwieldy- too many people to try to schedule to meet together at the same time- ended up meaning forgoing other goals/priorities during academic time, or after-hours meetings… would be better if integrated into career dev sessions during didactics or on-site ‘retreat’ days that include faculty or something. 7pm meetings just don’t work for some of us, and others have Thursday clinic, etc.” ID03

“I think it’d be great to have allotted time in the residents’ schedules to meet on a regular basis. The way it is now is a bit unstructured and we have to work on figuring out when everyone can meet- which is tricky.” ID29

Lack of structure

Residents and faculty shared the desire for more specific goals and discussion topics.

“It was hard with 4 different residents to feel like we had something to talk about, whereas in one on one mentorship scenarios I’ve had in the past it was clear that the agenda was to focus on my career development.” ID17

“Would be useful to have more structure regarding suggested scheduling and topics of discussion” ID20

“I was hoping the faculty member would set up a meeting for us all to meet eventually (all residents plus faculty mentor) but we haven’t done that. I think it’s a great idea but perhaps a system needs to be in place to ensure mentorship families are “actively” meeting.” ID10

“Meeting more frequently with more concrete goals.” ID15

Group mentorship limitations

Residents shared that the group mentorship setting was a barrier to asking for advice from faculty.

“Have stronger mentorship relationships with other faculty formed more naturally through shared interests and work experiences, and sometimes don’t feel as comfortable asking for advice on topics in these mentorship meetings.” ID18

“A bit impersonal, only met with advisor once or twice as a group, quite generalized Q&A format.” ID12

Lack of financial support

Faculty shared their desire for more departmental support.

“Would love to have support to take residents out to lunch or dinner.” ID28

“Could be helpful to have funding from the residency program for food/drink given inflation.” ID11