Healthcare Management and Staff Compensation Rises Amid Surge in Great Reshuffle

New data from MGMA provides medical practices with a compensation benchmark, offers recommendations for overcoming staffing challenges

ENGLEWOOD, Colo., June 22, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- In the face of rising inflation and intense competition for workers, new data from Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) reveals the salaries and wages of healthcare workers who weathered the pandemic storm are rising. Further analysis shows the surge in demand for workers is creating new challenges for medical practices and health systems in updating retention and recruitment strategies.

The 2022 edition of MGMA DataDive Management and Staff Compensation — which features data from more than 142,000 management and staff positions at 3,406 organizations — serves as a baseline for medical practices to benchmark operations.

Management positions at every level experienced some degree of compensation growth over the last year, with even more sizable compensation increases over the last three years. The largest yearly change among management positions was a 6.56% increase in median total compensation for executive management positions. Compensation differences for nursing positions over the last year varied, however notable increases have occurred over the last three years. Triage nurses saw the largest percent increase in median total compensation over the last three years at 13.91% from 2019 to 2021.

Data also revealed that experience and education make a difference in determining compensation. Executive management roles that hold a master's degree report earning 51% more in total compensation than their counterparts with a high school diploma. Compensation also varies widely by region with management positions reporting the highest compensation in the Western region and the lowest in the Southern region. In fact, executive management positions earned $23,084 more in the West compared to counterparts in the South.

MGMA's summary data report, "Competing for Talent and Building Culture amid the Great Reshuffle," provides further analysis of the 2022 DataDive. Even with COVID-19 case numbers dwindling from their peak, the ability to fully staff medical practices has been a major limiting factor for providers. A Nov. 2021 MGMA Stat poll found that 30% of medical groups were below their productivity goals for 2021, with many citing a lack of staffing as keeping them from attaining higher productivity. Staff shortages have resulted in higher rates of stress and burnout, contributing to a vicious cycle of employee turnover.

"Today's surge in demand for workers has created a compensation arms race forcing medical practices to revisit the ways in which they recruit, engage and nurture staff," said Halee Fischer-Wright, MD, MMM, FAAP, FACMPE, president and chief executive officer at MGMA. "To stay competitive, medical practice leaders must stay on the pulse of macroeconomic forces and invest in strategies that create rewarding and fulfilling workplaces. This latest data provides invaluable compensation benchmarks for job titles throughout a medical group practice — from the C-suite to the front desk — to help healthcare practices overcome retention and recruitment challenges."

Amid a staffing crisis, medical practices must pivot their employee offerings to remain successful. MGMA's summary data report offers additional strategies that healthcare leaders have executed to meet increasing employee demands.

As employee expectations and competition continue to rise in the healthcare industry, medical practices' strategic compensation and engagement offerings will be critical in boosting productivity levels.

To download a copy of the summary report, visit here. 

Founded in 1926, the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) is the nation's largest association focused on the business of medical practice management. MGMA consists of 15,000 group medical practices ranging from small private medical practices to large national health systems representing more than 350,000 physicians. MGMA helps nearly 60,000 medical practice leaders and the healthcare community solve the business challenges of running practices so that they can focus on providing outstanding patient care. Specifically, MGMA helps its members innovate and improve profitability and financial sustainability, and it provides the gold standard on industry benchmarks such as physician compensation. The association also advocates extensively on its members' behalf on national regulatory and policy issues. To learn more, go to mgma.com or follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.

Contact: Brad Krebs
press@mgma.org

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SOURCE Medical Group Management Association