Abstract：

China’s new round of health-care reform regards compensation reform in public hospitals as a key lever for motivating health professionals. Yet micro-level evidence on how current salary components shape clinicians’ behaviours remains scarce. Method We conducted 40- to 90-minute, semi-structured interviews with 12 purposively sampled clinicians and administrators in three tertiary public hospitals located in eastern, central and western China. Transcripts were analysed following Colaizzi’s seven-step phenomenological approach with NVivo 12. Result Four dominant themes emerged: income insecurity produced by an excessively low base-salary share; distortion of clinical behaviour under volume-based performance bonuses; deficit of intrinsic motivators such as academic recognition; a widely shared desire for a transparent, multidimensional and fairer package. Participants called for raising the base salary to 50–60 % of total income, replacing revenue-linked indicators with RVU-, DRG- and patient-experience metrics, and introducing non-monetary rewards (e.g., sabbaticals, tuition support for children). Conclusion The compensation package is not a neutral accounting device but a powerful transmitter of organisational values. Sustainable reform should balance extrinsic and intrinsic incentives while enhancing procedural justice.

Key Words：

public hospital; compensation structure; incentive; qualitative research; China