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BOB MOON: Let’s turn now to Richard DeKaser with The Parthenon Group, as Boston-based management consulting firm. Good morning.

RICHARD DEKASER: Good morning.

MOON: Let’s take that ADP payroll report first. 217, 000 new jobs unofficially — sounds good ahead of this Friday’s government tally.

DEKASER: Well it is good. This is about the third month that we’ve seen numbers around 200,000 — that’s the best three month string in about five years. So this is the easy one. Employment seems to be rising in the private sector — good news over all.

MOON: Well — but what about that report from Challenger, Gray and Christmas? It found the number of planned layoffs at U.S. firms rose in February to its highest level in 11 months — how do you balance those two?

DEKASER: Well I think in both cases weather is a little bit at play. So for example, in January — January this year, prior to February — we had the lowest level of layoffs according the Challenger folks in — well, ever, since they’ve been putting out their numbers back in 1993. That was probably due to blizzards. Business etiquette still doesn’t require, but holds for laying someone off in a face to face way, so workers showed up again in February and lay offs increased as a result. But I wouldn’t take that single month too desperately in isolation. I think what’s going on here has been a short term influence of weather.

MOON: And as we say the big number out Friday. Richard DeKaser with The Parthenon Group, as Boston-based management consulting firm. Thanks for your insights.

DEKASER: My pleasure.