Improving Mental Health and Resilience Training: Feedback from Military Personnel

Mental health and resilience training initiatives have been implemented in many military organizations with the intention of optimizing the psychological resilience of their military members. Capturing military members’ perspectives and feedback may contribute to informed decision-making and highlight opportunities for the further development and optimization of such training programs. Feedback on the existing mental health and stress exposure training (i.e., Road to Mental Readiness) was assessed through a combination of open- and closed-ended questions from an online survey of 793 actively serving Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members. The results indicate that increasing engagement, contextual relevance, frequency, as well as making efforts to decrease the stigma surrounding mental health are commonly perceived gaps and suggestions for training improvement from the perspective of military members. Perceived gaps may not be entirely due to shortcomings of the intervention itself – there is a need for root cause analysis of subjective perceptions prior to considering program changes. Future research and program development related to resilience training can incorporate end-user feedback to not only improve the programs based on the unique needs of the target audience but also help foster a relationship between decision-makers and end-users through shared decision-making and collaboration.