Is it lag and is the hiring real? re: Lag - someone joining a new job today was probably given an offer 3 months ago, and begun their recruiting process 6 mont

Is it lag and is the hiring real? re: Lag - someone joining a new job today was probably given an offer 3 months ago, and begun their recruiting process 6 months ago. re: Realness 1) I've been through a number of interview rounds at a number of firms in the last 3 months where either the role itself or the comp previously discussed suddenly became in question, and the process delayed or went on hold. I have 2x as many irons in the fire as usual this job hunt as I find continual head fakes, ghosting and just general flakiness. 2) From the other end I can tell you my management has asked our team to do what-if scenarios for anything from -50% to +50% staffing recently. With scenarios of cutting some/most consultants with 0 backfills, or converting some, adding full-timers, etc. 3) Even some of the shops I interview have made mention of cutting consultants as of late, so some of the hiring could just be conversion. 4) Lot of tech headlines of hiring freezes or pauses or chills