Harvard’s imposition of a hiring freeze on Monday morning interrupted faculty hiring processes across the University, leaving professors scrambling to figure out how to fill vacancies — and how to keep their departments’ work running if they can’t.

The freeze — which Harvard attributed to “financial uncertainties” under President Donald Trump — comes just as some departments look to finish their monthslong faculty hiring processes, which typically conclude by early March.

Department heads did not receive advance notice of the freeze, according to Philosophy professor and chair Bernhard Nickel. Instead, they learned of it when everyone else did — through a Monday morning announcement from President Alan M. Garber ’76 to faculty and staff across the University.

The hiring halt has left some programs, including the Classics and Philosophy departments, with unfilled faculty and staff vacancies. Some departments are now searching for ways to fill empty seats or to run courses they were depending on new hires to teach.

History professor Derek J. Penslar, the director of the Center for Jewish Studies, said the freeze has left two ongoing searches for Jewish studies professors and several visiting appointments in limbo. The pause comes at a particularly challenging time for the center because many of its key faculty positions are or will soon be vacant for unrelated reasons, Penslar added.

To make up for the unfilled positions, the center is arranging for several visiting professors to join and “provide essential temporary coverage,” Penslar wrote.

“I am deeply concerned about the freeze,” he added.

Classics professor Richard F. Thomas said the hiring pause has halted several searches for lecturers in his department in their early stages. Now, he said, the department is “not sure how to fill” the seats — and he and his colleagues may now have to teach additional courses to fill the gaps.