Page 29 - Delaware Medical Journal - February 2017
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YOUR CAREER
better than one with a higher base salary
Weigh It: Family Fit
Stuart Ort, MD was a successful otolaryngologist in California for eight years. He practiced with one other physician and had no employment-based reason to switch jobs. But as he weighed his happy job situation with a desire to be closer to family in the New York City area, family took the higher priority.
In his search for a new practice, Ort says
non-academic institution or group where I would be able to focus the vast majority of my time and energy on clinical work.”
Ort reached out to friends in the New
a large single-specialty ear, nose, and throat practice. Even though it is a much larger practice than his former employer, Ort reports that he is “very happy with how transparent the practice is and
the fact that no one feels like they are missing out or getting unfairly treated.” Despite moving cross-country to a very different practice environment, Ort says
To Help You Evaluate
To help ensure your new practice and community meet you and your family’s needs, ask these questions:
• What is the real estate market and school district like?
• Does the community offer access to my and my family’s religious, educational, and extracurricular needs?
• How close would I be to family and friends?
• How is the climate and environment?
• What community do most physicians live in? What is the commute like?
• What do physicians in the area do when they’re not working?
• What do other physicians and their families like best about living and working there?
Comparing Your Options
Some physicians compare the job-search process to a dating game: you meet a lot
of different people interested in getting to know you better, and they all want to see if you are compatible with them. Once you are interested, the employer prepares a contract
Mike Srulevich, DO, who recently changed jobs, was philosophical as he considered
a new opportunity. A change in jobs “can by transformative on several levels,” he says. “You may have been doing the job for years, but all of a sudden it’s a new culture, a new schedule, and a lot of different personalities.”
Taking a new job, he says, is “like buying a new house: Finding it might be the easiest part.” Once you sign the employment contract you must “navigate the paperwork, coordinate schedules, and unpack life as it formerly was [in order to] start a new and different professional life.”
Just as in house-hunting or dating, physicians who are comparing options must understand and prioritize their own short- term and long-term goals. Choosing among multiple options is never easy. As you weigh objectives. Additionally, make sure that the with these objectives and matches your impression of the opportunity. Identifying what matters most to you will help you
make the choice that is most professionally and personally gratifying.
This article is reprinted with permission from the Fall 2016 issue of Practice Link.
CONTRIBUTING AUTHOR
■ BRUCE ARMON is Chair of the Health Care Practice Group at Saul Ewing LLP in Philadelphia.
Q: How open should I be about my other offers to potential employers?
A. Very open. Some physicians think that disclosing information about other offers will cost them money because they are hoping that my group will throw out a much higher number if we don’t know anything about the other offer. That might have been true in the Wild West days
of physician recruitment when employers could just “buy” doctors they wanted. In today’s environment with Stark Law, compensation is less of a black box, and more of an open fish bowl. We all have to comply with rules about Fair Market Value, and we all are accessing
the same national compensation data. There will still be huge differences between markets based on the reimbursement levels, job structure, and the level of difficulty of the search. But I can save you a lot of time by letting you know right away if I can be in the ballpark.
Stop short of sharing actual documents because that makes us a little queasy about integrity issues. Tell me that you are holding a competing offer with a base salary of X, a sign-on bonus of Y, and projected first year compensation of Z. We also want to know where the other offers are located and whether the offer is an income guarantee from a hospital, a salary from a private practice, or a hospital-employed position. That will help us talk you through the apples- to-oranges comparison. We can point out that our offer is lower on X, but has a much higher upside in future earning years and explain why. – Therese Karsten is director of physician recruitment for Hospital Corporation of America in the hospital system’s Continental Division.
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