The Office of Well-Being and Resilience

One important feature of our model is recognizing that it is not incumbent on you as an individual to “be well” or “get yourself well.” While we do encourage the development of your own personal well-being and resilience skills and that you take care of your mental health, we also recognize that much of what drives your well-being is related to the work environment and system-level factors.

The OWBR model is influenced by the current evidence base, as well as expressed sentiments of Mount Sinai students, graduate medical trainees, faculty, and others.

About Us

Created in 2018 and located within the Office of the Dean of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, we are a team dedicated to enhancing the well-being and resilience of medical and graduate students, graduate medical trainees, post-doctoral trainees, and faculty within the Mount Sinai Health System. We firmly believe that your professional fulfillment, personal well-being, and the meaning you derive from your work and education are essential elements of our Mount Sinai community missions to provide the highest quality care, conduct world-class research, and train tomorrow’s health care leaders.

Working with you and in collaboration with partners across the health system, it is our goal to drive change through new and current local and system-level efforts to optimize your well-being.  In working with our numerous partners, we aim to support and promote mutual values such as inclusive, equitable and diverse working environments, leadership skills development, high-quality mentorship, career development, and optimized utilization of technology to maximize function and minimize workload.

In addition, we work very closely with our partner office, the Office of Faculty Development to support faculty as they develop through each stage of their scientific, clinical, educational, and administrative careers via programming in career advancement, leadership development and mentorship enrichment.

We encourage you to explore our website to learn more about the initiatives that target each aspect of our model: workplace culture; workplace efficiency and function; mental health support; and personal factors and health. Here we briefly describe each element of our model.

Workplace Culture:  A well-being centered workplace culture is one in which faculty, employees and trainees feel they are valued, cared for and supported.  Culture includes the shared values and normative behaviors of an organization that are largely driven by leadership behaviors, communications and team dynamics that advance psychological safety in the community and can be promoted through leadership trainings, supportive tools and role modeling. 

Workplace Efficiency and Function: A well-being centered efficiency focused workplace is one in which job roles and responsibilities are clearly defined and feasible and teams work well together, optimally utilizing communication techniques and iteratively refined workflows to maximize the efficiency and function of the work environment.

Mental Health Support: A well-being centered approach to mental health makes it clear to faculty, employees and trainees that mental health (just like physical health) is a priority, mental health symptoms and problems are very common, there are no repercussions to help-seeking, and mental health care is easily accessible to all whenever it is needed. 

Personal Factors and Health: A well-being centered approach to personal factors and health recognizes that stress and physical health can greatly influence one’s well-being both at home and at work.  Therefore, offering easily accessible well-being and resilience trainings, sessions and tools for personal wellness as well as physical healthcare, is essential to promote the well-being of faculty, employees and trainees.