Not necessarily. Identify the actual responsibilities and authority that resume, including any changes made during the absence. The proposed role requires its own factual assessment. Compare the documents rather than the labels. An internal grading structure exists for pay bands and reporting lines, whereas managerial capacity is judged on what the person supervises, hires, fires or directs, and at what level of the organization. Where a pre-leave job description survives untouched but the team beneath it does not, that description has stopped being evidence of anything.
Review duties rather than the return announcement
Explain what the applicant will manage or direct and what operational work remains personal. A familiar title does not establish that the old support structure or authority still exists. Executive capacity and managerial capacity are distinct tests, and someone who leads a function may satisfy one without the other.
Managing an essential function rather than personnel is recognised, though it calls for a plain account of what the function is, who carries out the operational tasks within it, and what discretion the applicant holds over it. Set out the reporting line above and below the position as it will stand on the day the assignment begins, not as it stood before the absence. One continuous year of qualifying employment abroad within the preceding three years, with a qualifying related entity, must still be established whatever the returning role is called.