Haha.
But seriously, trying to meet ridiculous expectations will make people miserable.
The general surgery residents at our hospital are the most miserable group of people there because of this attitude "I'm not impressed unless you can shovel an incredible amount of $h@t so the residents don't have to, predict whimsical and fickle desires, know every lab value on a patient from days before even though it's right on 100 computers all around you (what was his phos level last Thursday!!!??? 2.0 sir! Anything else boss?). Make sure you know every residents unique desires on how they want things laid out, and on top of that you need to
know every bit of relevant anatomy and clinical knowledge of surgery (being in the top 70/80% of medical students wouldn't fit this - you need to probably be top 5% - i.e. 260+ Step 1). Next, be smart but unassuming. Make sure everyone likes you, be on top of your game for every second of the day, and hope that you make the person / slave of the next month look bad because you were so good. Oh, and you're expected to do all this - doing it garners no appreciation or gratitude - you can only meet expectations which warrants no thanks or fail, which is met with disgust.
WTF
What a miserable miserable environment. Seriously, the most
self-centered and miserable people in my hospital were the gen surg residents. I have no issues with general surgery in general but our department was terrible. In stark contrast, the surgical subspecialties residents learned people skills and have some element of empathy / camaraderie.
It's such a terrible environment. I know powerful people who treat their secretaries better, their maids better. I've seen people running entire departments give more respect to a janitorial staff. It's ridiculous and incredibly hard to understand why the environment is so terribly $h!tty. I can't understand it and I think some of the worst weeks of my life were spending 12+ hrs a day with these miserable people alongside their "I'm not impressed" attitude.
I've worked with resident who take the attitude to medical students, "Hey, I'm here to serve you and make sure you get a lot out of this shift and learn as much as possible. Let me know if I can help you or if I can teach you anything."
What a difference. Cooperation, teamwork, good attitudes.
It's funny that some medical students are paying 70k per year to get $h!t on by miserable people.
I'm glad that many departments aren't like this.