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KIRKLAND · L-1A FIELD GUIDE

Must the proposed role repeat the applicant’s current job?

Sources checked:

THE DIRECT ANSWER

Have the actual foreign and proposed roles assessed under the applicable L rules. A changed role is a fact to analyze, not a reason to relabel the employment history. No. The proposed position must qualify on its own facts, and echoing the current job is neither required nor helpful. The condition that does bind sits on the other side of the border: one continuous year of qualifying employment abroad within the three years preceding the request, in a managerial, executive or specialized-knowledge capacity, with a qualifying related entity.

Keep the two accounts accurate

Describe duties, dates and responsibilities as they existed and as proposed. Do not assume that a promotion establishes the required foreign capacity or U.S. managerial role.

The full classification and timing requirements need assessment. The description that fails is the one written to sound impressive. A line such as overseeing strategy for the region tells a reviewer nothing about whether anyone is supervised, which budget is controlled, or what the applicant may decide without approval.

A narrower account carries further, because each element can be checked against a document: named direct reports, authority to approve spending to a stated internal threshold, sign-off on vendor selection. Draft the proposed role from the organisation chart and the delegation of authority rather than from the announcement, and describe the foreign role the same way, out of records that existed before anyone considered a transfer.