Now, there is a term that's very, very important, and it is a concept called total compensation. What is total compensation? Well, it's something that you need to not forget and need to really focus in on. Total compensation can be defined in different ways, but in general, this includes both the monetary compensation, so the salary plus the clinical productivity, et cetera, that comes in your paycheck or that's reflected in your pay stub, plus the monetary value of the benefits and other perks that constitute the overall compensation package received by the EP. So total compensation includes not only the traditional components of monetary compensation, such as salary, productivity, incentive pay, and other components of the EP's regular paycheck, but it also incorporates the dollar value of some or all of the EP's benefits package, which can be substantial. These perks can include matched retirement contributions or a pension, special accounts from which the employed physician might pay for dental, vision-type care, or childcare for themselves and their families, generous vacation, leave travel policies, travel education budgets, tuition benefits, and so on. These benefits that are offered to EPs can actually be very generous at some institutions and often really contribute substantial monetary value to the overall take, the overall compensation package, really above and beyond base salary, productivity, and other direct monetary incentives. So when comparing compensation offers between employers, a truly accurate ability to compare requires that you look at the details of their total compensation package, not just the base pay and productivity incentive. This sort of total compensation comparison is an apples-to-apples comparison and it avoids undervaluing what might be a really generous total compensation package and high-value perks that really far exceed what's printed on the regular pay stuff.

Total compensation

employee remuneration

monetary compensation

benefits and perks

job offers