Team Dynamics

Team dynamics make an incredible impact on the experience as a medical student. I've had "bad" residents who are really inefficient, impolite, and poor role models. They might make students do more scut work (busywork) than we really should; I've been asked to do excessive non-emergent stuff for patients I wasn't following, and I thought that was unnecessary. I've seen residents have poor attitudes and interpersonal relationships with staff. And I can tell when residents don't feel that teaching is their responsibility. On the other hand, I've had really excellent residents who set aside time for teaching even on their post-call days. They will give us constructive feedback about how to "look good" for the attending, show us how to do a good physical exam, and thoroughly read our notes. These residents don't use students merely as ways of expediting their own work; they instead encourage us to identify and pursue what we think would be valuable.