Empowering Incoming Fellows: A Structured Workshop to Enhance Teaching and Professional Skills

Background Transitioning into a graduate medical education (GME) fellowship presents challenges, including increased responsibilities and expectations. Fellows must supervise and teach trainees while navigating early career development. Many enter a fellowship with limited educational training. There is also a lack of specialty-specific resources and infrastructure to adequately prepare incoming fellows in these key educational areas. To support this transition, we developed a workshop focused on supervisory skills, on-shift teaching, and career development. The goal was to build fellows’ confidence and competence in educational roles while consolidating GME resources. Methods A four-hour workshop was created by GME leaders and physician educators. This was held at a large academic center in the Mountain West and was open to all incoming fellows in 2025. The topics included goal setting, supervision, feedback, work‒life balance, scholarship, and help-seeking. Recruitment occurred via email through program directors. Pre- and post-workshop surveys and knowledge assessments were conducted. Confidence ratings (5-point Likert scale) and knowledge scores (10 questions) were analyzed via paired t tests. Results Twenty-eight fellows from 13 specialties attended; 22 completed both surveys (79% response rate). Most were PGY-4 (59%) with prior supervisory experience (82%), but only 36% had formal education training. Knowledge scores improved (9.1–9.6, p  < 0.01), and confidence increased significantly in goal setting, feedback, and scholarship ( p  < 0.001). Eighty-six percent found the workshop useful and engaging. Conclusions This workshop fills a critical gap in educational training by equipping fellows with foundational supervisory and teaching skills while streamlining GME resources to support fellows across all specialties.