Haha that’s almost exactly what I said to my first offer. It was from a particular podiatry school as my co-fellow and I were finishing fellowship in 2007.
They told us that the students loved working with us and we were providing a bunch of coverage in the clinic. They’re prepared to offer us $90,000. I said to the Dean that the offer was so low, I couldn’t negotiate from that point. Double it and we can negotiate from that point. And I tapped my co-fellow on the leg and said let’s go. We walked out.
Then a week later I received a call, $110,000. I said thank you and I wasn’t a math major, but I don’t think double 90 is 110. It went up to 130 with a promise not to tell anyone else, because we’d be almost the highest paid at the school. In the end, I went to Broadlawns and my first year salary was $185,000 + relocation and good benefits.
Listen, I believe everyone now about all the low ball offers. My third year residents got some horrible (criminal) offers. I was angry and wanted to call these people out. But they have me to counsel them and I get them a good attorney to negotiate their contracts. Young DPMs need that counsel and if all else fails, you’re better off starting your own practice than working under bad conditions. And there are still many places you can do that and ways to limit your start-up costs.
I think we need to do a better job educating people on this.
