From the Editor: Building on Success
It’s been a year since CMIO put a stake in the ground, conducting the first-ever CMIO Compensation Survey. Some 225 chief medical information/informatics officers nationwide offered their insight, while establishing a baseline of compensation data upon which to build subsequent surveys.
We also made notes on improvements we’d make the second time out. We put those to use for the second annual CMIO Compensation Survey, streamlining our battery of questions to focus more on the bread-and-butter questions regarding salary level, bonuses and CMIO expectations for compensation and workload in the coming year. We’re happy to report 40 percent more CMIOs participated this year (thanks if you responded!).
Tracking trends with only two years’ worth of figures is risky business. For example, although more women took the 2011 Compensation Survey than took the first one, it’s not wise to assume that proportionally more women have joined the ranks of CMIO nationally within the past year. Likewise, although we garnered more responses from CMIOs who reportedly make more than $500,000 in compensation, clearly not everyone’s getting a fat raise. It’s also safe to assume that a somewhat larger percentage of responses in the under-$30,000 bracket doesn’t mean precipitous salary slides across the board. In fact, most respondents earn salaries in the $200,000 to $250,000 range—similar to our 2010 results.
More realistic conclusions can be drawn from the year-over-year comparisons of answers to other questions. As the economy continues to drag along, it’s no surprise, for example, that a notable percentage of respondents expect no raise, no bonus, or more work in the year ahead. But there are bright spots for sure. Compared with the 2010 survey, there is a small increase in the number of respondents who expect a raise and/or bonus this year. And in both surveys, more than 50 percent expect no change in their workload.
As we continue to survey CMIOs in coming years, we’ll see what trends emerge as we add more data to the salary set. However, I also will keep my favorite Mark Twain quote in mind as we crunch the numbers: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics.”
We also made notes on improvements we’d make the second time out. We put those to use for the second annual CMIO Compensation Survey, streamlining our battery of questions to focus more on the bread-and-butter questions regarding salary level, bonuses and CMIO expectations for compensation and workload in the coming year. We’re happy to report 40 percent more CMIOs participated this year (thanks if you responded!).
Tracking trends with only two years’ worth of figures is risky business. For example, although more women took the 2011 Compensation Survey than took the first one, it’s not wise to assume that proportionally more women have joined the ranks of CMIO nationally within the past year. Likewise, although we garnered more responses from CMIOs who reportedly make more than $500,000 in compensation, clearly not everyone’s getting a fat raise. It’s also safe to assume that a somewhat larger percentage of responses in the under-$30,000 bracket doesn’t mean precipitous salary slides across the board. In fact, most respondents earn salaries in the $200,000 to $250,000 range—similar to our 2010 results.
More realistic conclusions can be drawn from the year-over-year comparisons of answers to other questions. As the economy continues to drag along, it’s no surprise, for example, that a notable percentage of respondents expect no raise, no bonus, or more work in the year ahead. But there are bright spots for sure. Compared with the 2010 survey, there is a small increase in the number of respondents who expect a raise and/or bonus this year. And in both surveys, more than 50 percent expect no change in their workload.
As we continue to survey CMIOs in coming years, we’ll see what trends emerge as we add more data to the salary set. However, I also will keep my favorite Mark Twain quote in mind as we crunch the numbers: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics.”