Medical Staff Clinician Well-Being Workshops
VMS is pleased to continue our partnership with Doug Wysockey-Johnson of WyJo Consulting to offer no-cost clinician wellbeing workshops over 2026.
These workshops are designed to support clinicians in meeting the demands of modern health care. Workshops are built around Doug’s daily experience working with physicians, nurses, APPs and clinical leaders across the country. These meetings are designed to be efficient, effective and interactive, with topics that directly address the biggest challenges clinicians face daily
Presenter: Our workshops are led by Doug Wysockey-Johnson, a seasoned facilitator with 23 years of experience leading clinician groups. Doug has been partnering with the Vermont Medical Society to provide clinician wellbeing workshops to Vermont medical staffs and practices since 2019. He and his family live in Richmond, VT. Click here for Doug’s full bio.
Presentation Format/Length: The workshops can be adjusted to fit a variety of formats, including monthly meetings, grand rounds, off-site retreats, and CME/CNE offerings and lasting anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours, tailored to your needs. Workshops are available via videoconference or in-person. Topics listed here are the starting point for the conversation, and these can be combined or modified to meet your specific goals. Many locations choose to offer these for Continuing Education credit.
Cost: The Vermont Medical Society (www.vtmd.org) is supporting these presentations so that they are available to up to 9 practices over the course of 2026 at no cost.
If you are interested in learning more or scheduling a Clinician Workshop, please contact Jessa at jbarnard@vtmd.org or Doug at dougwyjo@gmail.com.
2026 Workshop Topics
Dealing with the Reverberations of Adverse Events, Medical Error and Bad Outcomes
Description: According to the AMA, 31% of physicians will be sued at some point in their career. (In certain specialties that percentage is much higher). Over 50% will make a medical error with a bad outcome, and 100% will be involved in some kind of patient safety issue or ‘near miss.’ These experiences often lead to emotional distress, sometimes described as the “second victim” phenomenon. Feelings of guilt, shame, loss of confidence are common when this occurs. Without requiring personal disclosure, this workshop will provide general ideas on how to cope and heal from these types of adverse events.
A Realistic Look at Resiliency and Work-Home Equilibrium for Clinicians
Description: Work-Home “Balance” is one of those phrases that sounds nice in theory but is challenging for clinicians to pull off. This workshop will take an honest look at what kind of work-home equilibrium is possible for clinicians. More importantly, evidenced-based tools will be offered on how to move toward better work-home stability that fits each individual clinician’s stage of life.
Taming the Tiger of Chronic Negative Thoughts
Description: Every clinician has negative thoughts. And why wouldn’t you? Practicing medicine is hard enough, without all the additional factors that make it so challenging in 2026. Our negative thoughts are normal, but dwelling in them chronically is an unnecessary recipe for burnout. In this workshop, we will look at a few evidence-based tools to help clinicians address and release chronic negative thoughts.
Leveraging Your Emotional Intelligence to Feel Better and Improve Team Culture
Description: The research is clear—emotional intelligence and self awareness impact everything from personal happiness to team cohesion. Emotionally Intelligent clinicians have increased ability to address burnout, regulate emotions, build relationships and improve the staff teams and cultures where they work.
Communication Skills to Improve Relationships at Work and Home
Description: Using research from Crucial Conversations[i] and other communication models, this workshop is offered to improve relationships in any setting. A “crucial conversation” is a discussion between two or more people where “the stakes are high, opinions vary, and emotions run strong.” In other words, it’s the kind of interaction clinicians have all the time. In this interactive workshop, providers will be given the tools needed to improve relationships in any setting.
Lead Well While Being Well
Description: There is an increasing body of research linking the well-being of leaders to those they seek to lead. At the same time, the demands of leadership often make self-care challenging. This workshop is designed to give clinical and administrative leaders tools to care for the well-being of their teams while also practicing good self-care at the same time.
The above workshops and others can be adapted to meet your specific goals and health care context.
VMS Member Coaching
Continuing in 2026, VMS is also making available at no cost up to 3 hour-long coaching sessions with Doug Wysockey-Johnson for interested VMS members. This is available to up to 5 members per year in the order of those who contact us. WyJo coaching provides dedicated 1-on-1 time to focus on specific challenges ranging from leadership or professional issues to work-home equilibrium or burnout. As with other program options, coaching can be done in-person or via video conference.
Doug Wysockey-Johnson was the Executive Director of Lumunoswellbeing for 23 years, and now is a certified Executive Leadership Coach and consultant/facilitator. He has been working closely with physicians, APPs and nurses through 1-1 coaching and Peer Support Groups.
For more information, please reach out to dougwyjo@gmail.com or jbarnard@vtmd.org.
[i] Crucial Conversation, Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler
McGraw Hill; 2nd edition (September 7, 2011)