EB5 INVESTORS M AGAZINE
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presence. Why? Because paramount to proving that the
prospective beneficiary will be either an executive or
a manager in the United States is showing a sufficient
number of direct reports underneath them — ideally,
people who themselves handle advanced business
tasks, rather than routine administration or office jobs.
Sketching out the new organizational chart inside a
business plan offers a convenient litmus test. Consider
this scenario: A Chinese food company plans to expand
into the U.S. restaurant industry and wants to send a
ranking executive to oversee this new line of business. In
a single-location restaurant, the senior person on staff
is likely overseeing frontline employees, like cooks and
servers. For USCIS, those duties will not pass muster for
an L-1 visa. Instead, the L-1A holder may need to oversee
two or more locations (or, in the franchise model, an
entire territory) with a middle tier of management in
order to convince an adjudicator that they’ll serve in an
executive-caliber capacity in the United States.
THE IMPORTANCE OF DAILY DUTIES
While it may seem impossible to pinpoint exactly how
much time you dedicate to different types of tasks
each week — much less to accurately hypothesize
how your attentions will evolve over the course of an
entire year of running a business — that’s precisely
the level of detail USCIS wants to see. It is important
to the successful presentation of an L-1 visa case that
the filing materials establish the beneficiary as an
indispensable part of the expansion plans, someone
whose background, guidance and input are invaluable.
As such, it is crucial to first explain their skill set and
outline why the person will be instrumental to the U.S.
office, in addition to providing granular details about
the various roles he or she will fulfill in the new entity.
Ideally, as an accompaniment to the I-129 filing,
the applicant’s business plan should include a chart
showing a percentage breakdown of which executive-
tier tasks this person will perform. Even if this feels
like intelligent guesswork — and it typically is, in the
case of a new office — this element is critical to the
It is important to the
successful presentation
of an L-1 visa case that
the filing materials
establish the beneficiary
as an indispensable part
of the expansion plans...
”
USCIS-Compliant Organizational Chart
CEO
L-1 Beneficiary
Service Section
Manager
HR Manager
Marketing Manager
Kitchen Section
Manager
Events Section
Manager (part time)
smooth adjudication of an L-1 visa. In a managerial
case, identifying the management tasks and the people
who answer to the beneficiary will strengthen the case.
Either way, there needs to be a clear differentiation
bet ween executive-level task s and managerial-
level tasks for both the subsidiary and the overseas
company, as USCIS is firm on selecting one or the other.
A BUSINESS PLAN: WHAT DOES IT NEED?
The management summary and organizational charts take
on an outsized role in an L-1A, but what else is important to
establish? Typically, there is a direct correlation between
the foreign company and the U.S. entity. For example, an
industrial chemicals company in India that sells mainly to
American corporations in the South envisions a stronger
U.S. presence by way of a new office in Houston. Here,
highlighting the parent company’s track record, product
line and recent financial performance is helpful, as is
showing where the prospective beneficiary sits in the
foreign company’s organizational chart. If the U.S. entity
will pursue an unrelated line of business, describing that
service or product clearly is the best place to start. From
there, a compelling market analysis should show not just
the scope of the opportunity, but the state of the industry,
the prevailing trends and the competitive forces that the
new office will face.
The business plan should also include a marketing and
growth plan describing how the new office will flourish
under the L-1A holder’s guidance. Next, the personnel
plan will function best with descriptions of duties for
all supervised employees, as well as a timeline for
onboarding. Lastly, photos of the U.S. office can pay big