Hiring Freeze! There is nothing more frustrating to a recruiter than this phrase. It doesn’t matter if you are a human resources representative for a company or a recruitment agency. A tech hiring freeze is usually the result of efforts to cut down costs and sometimes the impact of recession or scale down of the organization. When recruiting and hiring stops, a company can save money and remain operational. Now, how can you, as a recruiter, use this time positively? The following tips will help you make the most out of your company’s hiring freeze, retain and understand employees, improve your hiring process and come up with great ideas for future hires. Before that, Let’s first understand a tech hiring freeze and the reasons for its occurrence.

What is a hiring freeze?

When a company decides to halt hiring for new positions, it is called a hiring freeze. Though the company may continue to hire candidates for essential jobs, it stops all efforts to fill non-essential jobs and prohibits creating new positions. Tech hiring freezes typically begin with a halt to these actions: sourcing\screening, interviewing, and hiring.

Main reasons behind a hiring freeze

Every business aims to maintain long-term financial viability. Fears of a recession, a pandemic, and supply chain disruptions force companies to halt hiring during difficult market conditions. When these circumstances arise, management may freeze hiring. Here are some examples of situations where a company might consider a hiring freeze:

1. Uncertain market conditions:

Market volatility and fluctuation can significantly affect revenue generation and profitability.

2. Global crisis:

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted every business in some way to a certain extent. These crises have negatively impacted businesses worldwide. Moreover, layoffs and tech hiring freezes were the only way for companies to sustain themselves then.

Also, read: 4 Images That Show What Developers Think Of Layoffs In Tech

3. Emerging liquidity concerns:

Companies may postpone recruitment processes if liquid assets decline. Thus, they may opt to deploy funds from the pay budget to finance current assets to increase liquidity.

4. Budget deficit:

When a company anticipates that hiring new employees will lead to a budget deficit, it will postpone hiring new employees until its financial position improves.

Effects of a tech hiring freeze on current employees

A hiring freeze can also be stressful for current employees owing to increased resource utilization to meet the deadlines and workload allocation within the available workforce. In addition, the workloads of departing employees are distributed among the remaining staff. In turn, this can negatively affect staff productivity, causing more employees to leave the company. So, during the hiring freeze, if recruiters are not hiring, then what do they do? Here are some best practices a recruiter (or a company) can use to motivate and retain current employees and smooth future hiring processes.

Things recruiters can do during a hiring freeze

How Recruiters Can Stay Active During A Hiring Freeze

Improve your hiring process for the future

During the hiring freeze, you have plenty of time to look into hiring gaps and plan for better future recruitment. For instance, you can check your existing hiring metrics and data to know what area to focus on to improve the hiring process. You can also review previous recruiting reports and methods provided by your ATS. You can then conclude,

how much does hiring for a particular role cost
what are the best sources/channels to find the right candidate
what is the job acceptance rate for your company
why candidates might drop off during an assessment phase
what does the candidate interview experience look like

This exercise will give you a grasp of what needs to be fixed in your hiring process.

Also, read: Streamline Your Recruitment Process With These 7 Tips

Furthermore, you can discuss key points with managers and team leaders to better understand their current objectives and future goals. This way, you can obtain a preview of the competencies and potential positions your company may require in the future. Also, you can create more crisp and clear job descriptions. In a nutshell, the more time you spend closing process gaps, the easier it will be to recruit again.

Build your employer’s brand

A strong employer brand always stands out and attracts talent. Amidst a tech hiring freeze, you can focus on building an impactful employer brand. Showcase your company’s work culture, ethics, and perks because it affects the candidate’s decision to join your company. Consider using video content, as this format makes it much easier for you to showcase your company’s culture and values. Furthermore, building an employer brand is not just for hiring new candidates; it is also suitable for existing employees. Employees who feel valued and appreciated will stay with the company for a long time. To improve your employer brand both from an employee’s and a candidate’s perspective, follow these tips:

For employees:

Employees are your biggest asset, and retaining the best candidates is essential. It is more likely to happen when your employees are happy working for you and feel valued and recognized for their efforts. You might have already provided your employees with all the perks. But always look to see if there is anything else you can do to increase their productivity at the workplace or improve their mental and physical health. Moreover, you can keep them engaged in fun activities or sports, take their feedback, or conduct some counseling sessions for employees for better work-life balance or mental health awareness. Also, employees love it when a company recognizes their hard work and loyalty and rewards them with appraisals, incentives, and bonuses. You can also send them personalized emails and gift cards to keep them motivated.

Also, read: 7 Employee Engagement Strategies For WFH Tech Teams

For candidates:

Before applying or accepting the offer, applicants tend to go through social media, Glassdoor, or Google reviews to learn more about the company’s culture. It means you can leverage the power of social media to showcase your company’s culture and the working lives of your current employees, for example,

Appreciate your current employees on LinkedIn, tag them, and rework your career pages.
Work on Glassdoor and google reviews of your company. You can’t stop negative reviews on these platforms, but you can humbly reply.
Show behind the scenes of your office, celebrating birthdays, festivals, etc.
Take feedback from your current employees, ask about their experience in your company, make a video, and share it on social media.
Always check the tonality of your social media posts. It should be gender-neutral and easy to understand.

Companies that embrace and practice diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) are more likely to outperform their competitors in terms of profitability and value creation. You can also make a plan for reverting or giving feedback to each applicant applying for a job opening at your company. Note: Do not ghost any applicant when you reject any candidate. It can create a bad image for your organization.

Also, read: How Tech Recruiters Can Build Better Employer Branding With Marketing

Build Candidate Relationships

A tech hiring freeze is the best time to expand your candidate pools with skilled candidates. Use this downtime to nurture relationships with passive candidates via social recruiting. Take advantage of recruiting tools. These tools help you connect with freshers and professionals and build relationships that will come in handy for future hiring. Keep your talent pipelines warm by sending them regular company updates, content that showcases your company culture, relevant articles, and webinars that may interest your prospective candidates. When the time comes to hire again, you wouldn’t have to start from scratch! You have your trusty candidate pool to fall back on.

Brush up on your recruiting skills

Although HR teams are constantly busy, a hiring freeze gives the recruitment team time to update their skills. The organization’s human resources department can enhance the whole company’s performance. As a result, in the HR position, you must always keep abreast of new industry regulations, technological advancements, and other human resource management techniques. Moreover, many HR training programs are available over the internet, like HackerEarth’s Learning and Development for HR, so you can better utilize your time to understand the HR ecosystem.

Also, read: Spend A Day With A Tech Recruiter

We’ve gone one step further and reached out to our Senior TA, Shalini Chandra to spill the beans on how to navigate this hiring freeze and become a better recruiter. Watch the video to get tips straight from the horse’s mouth!

FAQs related to hiring freeze

How to keep candidates engaged during a hiring freeze?

Stay in touch with candidates; provide timely responses to any emails
Share company updates and other relevant information like PR releases, blogs, and podcasts to keep candidates interested
Work on establishing an employer brand

How long does a hiring freeze usually last?

Depending on the reason, a hiring freeze usually lasts for 3-6 months but can last up to weeks, months, or years.

What are the advantages of a tech hiring freeze?

A hiring freeze reduces hiring costs; reducing these expenses can result in the return of financial stability.
Hiring freezes allow management to condense staff and reorganize workgroups to produce necessary products and services for consumers more efficiently.
It also strengthens teamwork and allows the company to review its growth plans and operational procedures.

Conclusion

A tech hiring freeze gives the organization and recruitment team time to focus on other essential things and prepare for future hiring. Use the methods mentioned above during the hiring freeze to rework the overall hiring process, increase the productivity of current employees, and retain employees. This time can be fruitful for organizations if used correctly.

I Used AI to Build a "Simple Image Carousel" at VibeCodeArena. It Found 15+ Issues and Taught Me How to Fix Them.

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My Learning Journey

I wanted to understand what separates working code from good code. So I used VibeCodeArena.ai to pick a problem statement where different LLMs produce code for the same prompt. Upon landing on the main page of VibeCodeArena, I could see different challenges. Since I was interested in an Image carousal application, I picked the challenge with the prompt "Make a simple image carousel that lets users click 'next' and 'previous' buttons to cycle through images."

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Within seconds, I had code from multiple LLMs, including DeepSeek, Mistral, GPT, and Llama. Each code sample also had an objective evaluation score. I was pleasantly surprised to see so many solutions for the same problem. I picked gpt-oss-20b model from OpenAI. For this experiment, I wanted to focus on learning how to code better so either one of the LLMs could have worked. But VibeCodeArena can also be used to evaluate different LLMs to help make a decision about which model to use for what problem statement.

The model had produced a clean HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. The code looked professional. I could see the preview of the code by clicking on the render icon. It worked perfectly in my browser. The carousel was smooth, and the images loaded beautifully.

But was it actually good code?

I had no idea. That's when I decided to look at the evaluation metrics

What I Thought Was "Good Code"

A working image carousel with:

Clean, semantic HTML
Smooth CSS transitions
Keyboard navigation support
ARIA labels for accessibility
Error handling for failed images

It looked like something a senior developer would write. But I had questions:

Was it secure? Was it optimized? Would it scale? Were there better ways to structure it?

Without objective evaluation, I had no answers. So, I proceeded to look at the detailed evaluation metrics for this code

What VibeCodeArena's Evaluation Showed

The platform's objective evaluation revealed issues I never would have spotted:

Security Vulnerabilities (The Scary Ones)

No Content Security Policy (CSP): My carousel was wide open to XSS attacks. Anyone could inject malicious scripts through the image URLs or manipulate the DOM. VibeCodeArena flagged this immediately and recommended implementing CSP headers.

Missing Input Validation: The platform pointed out that while the code handles image errors, it doesn't validate or sanitize the image sources. A malicious actor could potentially exploit this.

Hardcoded Configuration: Image URLs and settings were hardcoded directly in the code. The platform recommended using environment variables instead - a best practice I completely overlooked.

SQL Injection Vulnerability Patterns: Even though this carousel doesn't use a database, the platform flagged coding patterns that could lead to SQL injection in similar contexts. This kind of forward-thinking analysis helps prevent copy-paste security disasters.

Performance Problems (The Silent Killers)

DOM Structure Depth (15 levels): VibeCodeArena measured my DOM at 15 levels deep. I had no idea. This creates unnecessary rendering overhead that would get worse as the carousel scales.

Expensive DOM Queries: The JavaScript was repeatedly querying the DOM without caching results. Under load, this would create performance bottlenecks I'd never notice in local testing.

Missing Performance Optimizations: The platform provided a checklist of optimizations I didn't even know existed:

No DNS-prefetch hints for external image domains
Missing width/height attributes causing layout shift
No preload directives for critical resources
Missing CSS containment properties
No will-change property for animated elements

Each of these seems minor, but together they compound into a poor user experience.

Code Quality Issues (The Technical Debt)

High Nesting Depth (4 levels): My JavaScript had logic nested 4 levels deep. VibeCodeArena flagged this as a maintainability concern and suggested flattening the logic.

Overly Specific CSS Selectors (depth: 9): My CSS had selectors 9 levels deep, making it brittle and hard to refactor. I thought I was being thorough; I was actually creating maintenance nightmares.

Code Duplication (7.9%): The platform detected nearly 8% code duplication across files. That's technical debt accumulating from day one.

Moderate Maintainability Index (67.5): While not terrible, the platform showed there's significant room for improvement in code maintainability.

Missing Best Practices (The Professional Touches)

The platform also flagged missing elements that separate hobby projects from professional code:

No 'use strict' directive in JavaScript
Missing package.json for dependency management
No test files
Missing README documentation
No .gitignore or version control setup
Could use functional array methods for cleaner code
Missing CSS animations for enhanced UX

The "Aha" Moment

Here's what hit me: I had no framework for evaluating code quality beyond "does it work?"

The carousel functioned. It was accessible. It had error handling. But I couldn't tell you if it was secure, optimized, or maintainable.

VibeCodeArena gave me that framework. It didn't just point out problems, it taught me what production-ready code looks like.

My New Workflow: The Learning Loop

This is when I discovered the real power of the platform. Here's my process now:

Step 1: Generate Code Using VibeCodeArena

I start with a prompt and let the AI generate the initial solution. This gives me a working baseline.

Step 2: Analyze Across Several Metrics

I can get comprehensive analysis across:

Security vulnerabilities
Performance/Efficiency issues
Performance optimization opportunities
Code Quality improvements

This is where I learn. Each issue includes explanation of why it matters and how to fix it.

Step 3: Click "Challenge" and Improve

Here's the game-changer: I click the "Challenge" button and start fixing the issues based on the suggestions. This turns passive reading into active learning.

Do I implement CSP headers correctly? Does flattening the nested logic actually improve readability? What happens when I add dns-prefetch hints?

I can even use AI to help improve my code. For this action, I can use from a list of several available models that don't need to be the same one that generated the code. This helps me to explore which models are good at what kind of tasks.

For my experiment, I decided to work on two suggestions provided by VibeCodeArena by preloading critical CSS/JS resources with <link rel="preload"> for faster rendering in index.html and by adding explicit width and height attributes to images to prevent layout shift in index.html. The code editor gave me change summary before I submitted by code for evaluation.

Step 4: Submit for Evaluation

After making improvements, I submit my code for evaluation. Now I see:

What actually improved (and by how much)
What new issues I might have introduced
Where I still have room to grow

Step 5: Hey, I Can Beat AI

My changes helped improve the performance metric of this simple code from 82% to 83% - Yay! But this was just one small change. I now believe that by acting upon multiple suggestions, I can easily improve the quality of the code that I write versus just relying on prompts.

Each improvement can move me up the leaderboard. I'm not just learning in isolation—I'm seeing how my solutions compare to other developers and AI models.

So, this is the loop: Generate → Analyze → Challenge → Improve → Measure → Repeat.

Every iteration makes me better at both evaluating AI code and writing better prompts.

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What This Means for Learning to Code with AI

This experience taught me three critical lessons:

1. Working ≠ Good Code

AI models are incredible at generating code that functions. But "it works" tells you nothing about security, performance, or maintainability.

The gap between "functional" and "production-ready" is where real learning happens. VibeCodeArena makes that gap visible and teachable.

2. Improvement Requires Measurement

I used to iterate on code blindly: "This seems better... I think?"

Now I know exactly what improved. When I flatten nested logic, I see the maintainability index go up. When I add CSP headers, I see security scores improve. When I optimize selectors, I see performance gains.

Measurement transforms vague improvement into concrete progress.

3. Competition Accelerates Learning

The leaderboard changed everything for me. I'm not just trying to write "good enough" code—I'm trying to climb past other developers and even beat the AI models.

This competitive element keeps me pushing to learn one more optimization, fix one more issue, implement one more best practice.

How the Platform Helps Me Become A Better Programmer

VibeCodeArena isn't just an evaluation tool—it's a structured learning environment. Here's what makes it effective:

Immediate Feedback: I see issues the moment I submit code, not weeks later in code review.

Contextual Education: Each issue comes with explanation and guidance. I learn why something matters, not just that it's wrong.

Iterative Improvement: The "Challenge" button transforms evaluation into action. I learn by doing, not just reading.

Measurable Progress: I can track my improvement over time—both in code quality scores and leaderboard position.

Comparative Learning: Seeing how my solutions stack up against others shows me what's possible and motivates me to reach higher.

What I've Learned So Far

Through this iterative process, I've gained practical knowledge I never would have developed just reading documentation:

How to implement Content Security Policy correctly
Why DOM depth matters for rendering performance
What CSS containment does and when to use it
How to structure code for better maintainability
Which performance optimizations actually make a difference

Each "Challenge" cycle teaches me something new. And because I'm measuring the impact, I know what actually works.

The Bottom Line

AI coding tools are incredible for generating starting points. But they don't produce high quality code and can't teach you what good code looks like or how to improve it.

VibeCodeArena bridges that gap by providing:

✓ Objective analysis that shows you what's actually wrong
✓ Educational feedback that explains why it matters
✓ A "Challenge" system that turns learning into action
✓ Measurable improvement tracking so you know what works
✓ Competitive motivation through leaderboards

My "simple image carousel" taught me an important lesson: The real skill isn't generating code with AI. It's knowing how to evaluate it, improve it, and learn from the process.

The future of AI-assisted development isn't just about prompting better. It's about developing the judgment to make AI-generated code production-ready. That requires structured learning, objective feedback, and iterative improvement. And that's exactly what VibeCodeArena delivers.

Here is a link to the code for the image carousal I used for my learning journey

#AIcoding #WebDevelopment #CodeQuality #VibeCoding #SoftwareEngineering #LearningToCode

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Revolutionizing Mobile Talent Hiring: The HackerEarth Advantage

The demand for mobile applications is exploding, but finding and verifying developers with proven, real-world skills is more difficult than ever. Traditional assessment methods often fall short, failing to replicate the complexities of modern mobile development.

Introducing a New Era in Mobile Assessment

At HackerEarth, we're closing this critical gap with two groundbreaking features, seamlessly integrated into our Full Stack IDE:

Now, assess mobile developers in their true native environment. Our enhanced Full Stack questions now offer full support for both Java and Kotlin, the core languages powering the Android ecosystem. This allows you to evaluate candidates on authentic, real-world app development skills, moving beyond theoretical knowledge to practical application.

Say goodbye to setup drama and tool-switching. Candidates can now build, test, and debug Android and React Native applications directly within the browser-based IDE. This seamless, in-browser experience provides a true-to-life evaluation, saving valuable time for both candidates and your hiring team.

Assess the Skills That Truly Matter

With native Android support, your assessments can now delve into a candidate's ability to write clean, efficient, and functional code in the languages professional developers use daily. Kotlin's rapid adoption makes proficiency in it a key indicator of a forward-thinking candidate ready for modern mobile development.

Breakup of Mobile development skills ~95% of mobile app dev happens through Java and Kotlin — This chart illustrates the importance of assessing proficiency in both modern (Kotlin) and established (Java) codebases.

Streamlining Your Assessment Workflow

The integrated mobile emulator fundamentally transforms the assessment process. By eliminating the friction of fragmented toolchains and complex local setups, we enable a faster, more effective evaluation and a superior candidate experience.

Old Fragmented Way vs. The New, Integrated Way — Visualize the stark difference: Our streamlined workflow removes technical hurdles, allowing candidates to focus purely on demonstrating their coding and problem-solving abilities.

Quantifiable Impact on Hiring Success

A seamless and authentic assessment environment isn't just a convenience, it's a powerful catalyst for efficiency and better hiring outcomes. By removing technical barriers, candidates can focus entirely on demonstrating their skills, leading to faster submissions and higher-quality signals for your recruiters and hiring managers.

A Better Experience for Everyone

Our new features are meticulously designed to benefit the entire hiring ecosystem:

For Recruiters & Hiring Managers:

Accurately assess real-world development skills.
Gain deeper insights into candidate proficiency.
Hire with greater confidence and speed.
Reduce candidate drop-off from technical friction.

For Candidates:

Enjoy a seamless, efficient assessment experience.
No need to switch between different tools or manage complex setups.
Focus purely on showcasing skills, not environment configurations.
Work in a powerful, professional-grade IDE.

Unlock a New Era of Mobile Talent Assessment

Stop guessing and start hiring the best mobile developers with confidence. Explore how HackerEarth can transform your tech recruiting.

A New Era of Code

Vibe coding is a new method of using natural language prompts and AI tools to generate code. I have seen firsthand that this change makes software more accessible to everyone. In the past, being able to produce functional code was a strong advantage for developers. Today, when code is produced quickly through AI, the true value lies in designing, refining, and optimizing systems. Our role now goes beyond writing code; we must also ensure that our systems remain efficient and reliable.

From Machine Language to Natural Language

I recall the early days when every line of code was written manually. We progressed from machine language to high-level programming, and now we are beginning to interact with our tools using natural language. This development does not only increase speed but also changes how we approach problem solving. Product managers can now create working demos in hours instead of weeks, and founders have a clearer way of pitching their ideas with functional prototypes. It is important for us to rethink our role as developers and focus on architecture and system design rather than simply on typing c

The Promise and the Pitfalls

I have experienced both sides of vibe coding. In cases where the goal was to build a quick prototype or a simple internal tool, AI-generated code provided impressive results. Teams have been able to test new ideas and validate concepts much faster. However, when it comes to more complex systems that require careful planning and attention to detail, the output from AI can be problematic. I have seen situations where AI produces large volumes of code that become difficult to manage without significant human intervention.

AI-powered coding tools like GitHub Copilot and AWS’s Q Developer have demonstrated significant productivity gains. For instance, at the National Australia Bank, it’s reported that half of the production code is generated by Q Developer, allowing developers to focus on higher-level problem-solving . Similarly, platforms like Lovable or Hostinger Horizons enable non-coders to build viable tech businesses using natural language prompts, contributing to a shift where AI-generated code reduces the need for large engineering teams. However, there are challenges. AI-generated code can sometimes be verbose or lack the architectural discipline required for complex systems. While AI can rapidly produce prototypes or simple utilities, building large-scale systems still necessitates experienced engineers to refine and optimize the code.

The Economic Impact

The democratization of code generation is altering the economic landscape of software development. As AI tools become more prevalent, the value of average coding skills may diminish, potentially affecting salaries for entry-level positions. Conversely, developers who excel in system design, architecture, and optimization are likely to see increased demand and compensation.
Seizing the Opportunity

Vibe coding is most beneficial in areas such as rapid prototyping and building simple applications or internal tools. It frees up valuable time that we can then invest in higher-level tasks such as system architecture, security, and user experience. When used in the right context, AI becomes a helpful partner that accelerates the development process without replacing the need for skilled engineers.

This is revolutionizing our craft, much like the shift from machine language to assembly to high-level languages did in the past. AI can churn out code at lightning speed, but remember, “Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand.” Use AI for rapid prototyping, but it’s your expertise that transforms raw output into robust, scalable software. By honing our skills in design and architecture, we ensure our work remains impactful and enduring. Let’s continue to learn, adapt, and build software that stands the test of time.

Ready to streamline your recruitment process? Get a free demo to explore cutting-edge solutions and resources for your hiring needs.

What Recruiters Can Focus On During A Tech Hiring Freeze

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