Promoting Self-Reflection and Dialogical Skills in Psychiatry Residents as Components of Professional Resilience: Feedback From Ongoing Systemic Learning–Based Workshops

Abstract

Background Psychiatry residency training requires not only biomedical and psychotherapeutic knowledge, but also advanced relational, communicative, and reflective competencies. Increasing evidence suggests that self-reflection, empathy, and communication skills are essential for both patient care and physician well-being. However, these competencies are often insufficiently addressed through structured experiential learning during psychiatric training. Objective This article presents an educational initiative developed at the University Psychiatric Clinic Ljubljana aimed at strengthening self-reflection, dialogical skills, and professional resilience among psychiatry residents through systemic learning–based workshops. Discussion The workshop programme, entitled Meta-knowledge in Psychotherapeutic Interventions in Psychiatry, integrates experiential learning, systemic thinking, and reflective dialogue within a psychologically safe educational environment. The initiative focuses on meta-level competencies derived from different psychotherapeutic traditions, including empathy, relational awareness, communication, and understanding of unconscious interpersonal processes. Since 2019, the workshops have been delivered regularly to psychiatry residents across different stages of training. Participants reported improved tolerance of uncertainty, increased awareness of communication dynamics, enhanced understanding of relational processes, and greater confidence in professional interactions with patients, colleagues, and multidisciplinary teams. Conclusions Educational environments that intentionally cultivate reflective and dialogical competencies may contribute substantially to professional resilience and well-being among psychiatry residents. The workshop model presented here illustrates how relatively small but continuous educational interventions can complement standard residency training while preserving the humanistic core of psychiatry in increasingly complex and technologically driven healthcare systems.