Originally Posted by Internal Memo

As you know, the four elements of our plan were:

To offer a voluntary resignation incentive for employees over age 50 with more than 10 years of service. This program was well received, and 110 of our colleagues have chosen to accept the voluntary resignation program. Most of those colleagues will be leaving by the end of the year and several divisions will host in-house going away parties to celebrate their many contributions.

To limit salary merit increases to employees making less than $60,000 annually. Employees eligible for merit increases will begin seeing them in their first paychecks in November

To freeze headcount at then-existing levels. Going forward we will continue to carefully review any open positions to determine whether filling those jobs is critical or not, and our preference will be to fill positions internally whenever possible.

Although a broad scale reduction in force was not necessary due to the success of the three components above, we have reduced staff in business units and in overhead groups. These targeted reductions, part of our continuing efforts to re-engineer our business processes and improve our efficiency, were necessary in order to meet our financial goals, to combat a turbulent economic environment, and to preserve the jobs we have going forward. Although there is still work to be done to eliminate redundancies, most reductions are now completed.

Additionally, as we continue to monitor our costs in this environment, we will not hold a holiday party at headquarters in New York.