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Q. Back in 2004, you addressed a question about hiring freezes and how they work in journalism. As you've no doubt noticed, the economy seems to be slipping enough for many newspapers and corporations to consider freezes.

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I'd like to know if your 2004 advice still holds true in today's economy. What happens if too many newsroom employees leave during a freeze and a company is reluctant to hire new people? How long can a freeze really last? And does your advice change if a corporation enforces a freeze in hopes of saving money lost from one or two poorly performing properties?

Chilly

A. The mechanics of hiring freezes haven't changed, but declining economic conditions make an update a good idea.

Joe Grimm

Hiring freezes are one of the more humane tools that management can use to pare payroll costs. Layoffs and buyouts can be more difficult for everyone. In a hiring freeze, a company simply decides not to do any hiring and to let attrition bring down the payroll.

Hiring freezes can cover the whole company, individual departments or single positions. And, yes, a corporation can certainly ask one of its locations to make cuts to compensate for financial trouble at another location. In fact, that makes more sense than for a corporation to have each company act as an isolated unit.

Typically, freezes are not uniformly solid. They might be thawed for a great candidate or to fill a critical position. It can be tough to estimate how long a freeze will last. Some freezes don't end until expenses drop to be in balance with revenues -- moving targets in themselves. Others last until a new budget year begins. These days, it seems, freezes are longer than in 2004 and frozen positions are sometimes wiped off the board forever.

A hiring freeze, while easier than layoffs, can still take its toll as work piles up on the remaining workers or as people are moved into jobs they don't want.

There can also be new opportunities during a freeze. For example, if a job you want opens while a freeze is excluding outside competitors, you may have a better shot than when the paper can conduct a national search and hire from the outside.

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Coming Wednesday: This reporter is struggling to choose between a small newspaper that seems to offer her everything she wants in a job and a community, and the more conventional choice of a larger newspaper.

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