Performance-Based Compensation Above Market Rates

Therapist and social worker compensation is not great (see Occupational Outlook Handbook). In large part, the pay problem is caused by lower reimbursement rates from insurance companies and linked to a shortage of qualified mental health workers—making recruitment and retention a big (and reoccurring) challenge facing health and human services executives.

One way to pay more without raising wage rates is to create performance-based compensation models for team members. For a performance-based compensation model to go above the market rate, organizations would have to set a base salary at or slightly above the market average, and then . . .