Residents as Mentors: The Development of Resident Mentorship Milestones

Mentorship of residents by more senior colleagues has been identified as important for stress management and creating an ideal learning environment.

We set out to define the attributes of an ideal resident mentor and explore ways to develop these attributes during residency training.

A 28-member, multi-specialty counsel of residents and fellows used 2 phases of a small group exercise. In the first phase, the group developed desirable attributes of resident mentors and explored means of developing these attributes. In the second phase, the group identified trends in the results, and in a second small group exercise with participants at a major national conference, refined these trends into Resident Mentorship Milestones.

The exercises identified 3 common themes: availability, competence, and support of the mentee. We defined milestones for mentorship in each of these areas.

The Resident Mentorship Milestones, developed by a national panel of residents, describe 3 key dimensions of mentorship: availability, defined as making time for mentorship; competence for and success in mentoring; and support of the mentee. These milestones may serve as a novel tool to develop and assess successful resident mentorship models.