Improving Psychological Well-being of Trainee Civil Servants in Pakistan

5 weekly, psycho-social skills development workshops will be conducted for newly inducted civil servants in groups, based on the problem management plus intervention. These workshops will be integrated into routine induction sessions of trainee civil servants. Workshop 1 orients participants to the intervention with motivational interviewing techniques to improve engagement, teaches the difference between technical and adaptive challenges, and trains participants in a basic stress management strategy. Workshop 2 addresses a participant-selected problem using problem-solving techniques and introduces behavioral activation. Workshops 3 and 4 support participants' continued application of problem solving, behavioral activation, and stress management and introduce strategies to strengthen social support networks whenever required. In Workshop 5, education about retaining intervention gains are provided and all learned strategies are reviewed.

The control group will receive 5 routine training induction sessions. These orientation sessions include lectures introduction to governance, public sector management, basic information technology, economics and public finance and official rules of procedure of the government of Pakistan. These lectures are held in a friendly and supportive environment.