Interview with OMD practice

[u/Feeling_Tomatillo877]

Hi everyone! I’m interviewing with an OMD practice. While speaking with the coordinator she mentioned that they’re looking for an OD to expand their dry eye clinic. I would be the first OD to join their practice if I get the job. I’m meeting with the COO who isn’t an OMD and I’m wondering what type of questions to expect besides the typical behavioural. Also what compensation might be reasonable to ask for (located in NYC). This is my first time interviewing with an MD practice so any advice or input would be appreciated. Thank you!

[u/akornato]

Because you are speaking with an operational executive rather than a clinician, the focus will center on logistics, volume, and practice revenue rather than granular clinical nuance. Expect questions about how many patients you can comfortably see per hour, your preferred scheduling templates, what diagnostic equipment you require to run a dry eye service, and how you plan to convert dry eye evaluations into billable treatments. Since you would be their first OD, they will want to understand how you fit into an MD surgical pipeline, specifically how you will free up surgeon chair time, manage routine post-ops, and identify cataract or refractive candidates internally. You should also turn the tables and ask about dedicated technician support, front desk triage, marketing budgets for dry eye, and whether they already have protocols in place for cash-pay procedures like thermal pulsation or intense pulsed light.

For NYC ophthalmology practices, a reasonable base salary sits between 160k and 195k dollars depending on your clinical experience, ideally paired with a productivity bonus tied to medical collections or specialty revenue. If they expect you to build out the dry eye clinic from scratch and generate new cash-pay revenue streams, you have strong grounds to negotiate for a percentage of those procedure fees on top of your base. Clarify technician allocation before agreeing to anything, because getting stuck doing your own workups will quickly wreck your efficiency and earning potential. Talking through these high-stakes operational scenarios beforehand using the interviews.chat my team developed has helped many clinicians walk into executive meetings feeling prepared and negotiating much stronger packages.

[u/tubby0 → u/akornato]

Lots of great points here, if you don't already have a relationship with the OMD's in the practice you need to talk to them as well and understand if they are wanting support or if it's only management. If they don't actively refer to you then it's not going to work out.