If you’re looking to sign a physician-employment contract with a new organization or renegotiate your existing contract, it’s essential to understand that the job market is different than when you last negotiated, even if that was just a few years ago. Just how much is at stake in contract negotiation? It might shock you: $3.5 million.
“This is what it will cost you if you sign a contract that's just 10% below the market value after being in practice for 25 years,” said Kyle Claussen, CEO of Resolve, a contract review and negotiation firm specializing in physician employment.
“You really want to do your homework and understand the process, understand the numbers and the dynamics as it relates to contract negotiations,” Claussen explained during a recent webinar on physician-employment contract review
A report on physician salary data (email registration required), released by Resolve this past summer, looks at the contract negotiation process in depth using real-world data from Resolve’s proprietary data set, rData. It explores dozens of contract terms, even highlighting differences by specialty and geographic region, to help you grasp the multitude of factors affecting what you can earn and how you can earn it.
“One of the most frequent mistakes among seasoned physicians was assuming that prior experience eliminated the need for formal contract review,” the report says. “Several late‑career physicians discovered unfavorable termination timelines, automatic renewal clauses or non‑competes ill‑suited to their current mobility needs despite having signed similar language earlier in their careers under very different circumstances.”
The AMA has teamed up with Resolve to provide custom contract review to AMA members at a discount. Resolve offers personalized legal experience to help physicians secure the best employment contract terms no matter where they are in their careers. Ready to access your AMA-member Resolve discount? Learn more now.
Why the data source matters
One of the most common, and confusing, things physicians encounter during contract negotiations is the median salary number. Employers will cite a variety of sources for their data, but only rData is drawn from verified contracts, reflecting current trends in each specialty's job market.
In addition, rData drills down to the state level.
“The clearest advantage in this year's data wasn't a single number, it was context,” the report says. “Out of 4,417 physician contracts across all 50 states, the spread between state medians showed physicians exactly where their own market stood ... something a national average can't do. The advantage isn't having more data. It's knowing which data is actually relevant to your negotiation.”
The report also emphasizes what happens if you don’t account for eventualities, such as quitting your job.
“Another recurring issue was the undervaluation of exit terms. Physicians nearing later career phases sometimes focus heavily on base compensation while overlooking tail malpractice costs, restrictive notice provisions or leadership role unwind clauses that could significantly limit flexibility in the final years of practice,” it says.
Why physician contract negotiation matters
Many physicians are reluctant to negotiate their contracts, often because their prospective employers tell them that their contracts can’t be modified, calling them “standard contracts.” Resolve warns that, unless you’re negotiating with a government agency like the Veterans Health Administration, this is almost always not true.
“The reality is that most contracts can be negotiated to some degree. And even though a practice may tell you that all contracts are standard and that nothing can be changed and that every physician there has signed the exact same contract, the fact is with Resolve, 85% of the contracts that they have [handled] have been negotiated,” Claussen said.
He also noted, “The more empowered you are to do the homework and have a company like Resolve to help you get that data, you will be in a more powerful position to negotiate.”
Claussen gave the example that if an employer says your fair market value is $160,000, but you've done your research and found it is $200,000, that leaves you room to negotiate.
“But if you don't have the data available to you and you don't have those resources, you'll just have to trust that the practice has done their homework,” he said.
What negotiation help looks like
The report cites the four largest base-salary increases Resolve helped individual physicians negotiate within a 12‑month window from 2025 to 2026:
- Diagnostic radiology: Settled at $735,000, an increase of $235,000.
- Invasive-interventional cardiology: Settled at $750,000, an increase of $200,000.
- Ob-gyn: Settled at $616,150, an increase of $271,150.
- Orthopaedic surgery, hand: Settled at $715,000, an increase of $214,500.
It also notes that Resolve negotiated over $16.5 million in additional base pay for physicians over that year.
“One of the great and interesting things that Resolve can do is if you have one or two or even more contracts, you can upload those contracts and Resolve can compare your contracts side by side and basically show you the most common components of a contract and see how they compare to each other,” Claussen said.
Ready to access your AMA-member Resolve discount? Learn more now.
