Start with the L-1A eligibility and application overview
Separate delegated decisions from approvals reserved abroad
Use examples of an actual budget, personnel decision or service-policy change. Identify what the US manager can decide and what must go to the foreign executive. The role must be primarily managerial or executive; a reporting line across a border does not determine that. Show who performs the operational tasks, since first-line supervision of nonprofessional staff does not qualify by title alone.
Link authority to the actual employment record
Record the qualifying corporate relationship and continuous full-time foreign year in the relevant three-year window. US days are excluded from that year, while qualifying short visits do not automatically interrupt it. General foreign service may have been managerial, executive or specialized knowledge, even though the US L-1A role needs its own qualifying management or executive duties. For new-office L-1A, the foreign year specifically must have been managerial or executive.
Document business beyond the reporting chart
A chart establishes neither the group’s activity nor the US operation’s age. Show regular, systematic and continuous goods or services through qualifying organizations in the US and another country. Date actual US business activity rather than incorporation. If that activity is less than one year, the new-office provisions apply to the assessment.
Explain how the delegated role can operate during launch
A new office needs sufficient premises and support for the qualifying US role within one year; initial approval is limited to one year. Relate the resources and staffing to the decisions delegated, not just the proposed title. Preserve later changes if the foreign executive takes authority back: the evidence must explain who really decides and what work remains with the applicant.
Identify the qualifying organization that continues business
Identify the essential function, the applicant’s senior position in relation to it and the discretion exercised over its daily operations. Managing an essential function of the organization at a senior level counts, provided the function is genuinely essential, the applicant operates at a senior level within the hierarchy, and the routine work of the function is performed by others. The Canadian employer and the American entity must stand in a qualifying relationship to one another as parent and subsidiary, as branch, or as affiliates, and both must be actively doing business rather than merely existing on a registry. Brief business trips to the United States generally do not break continuity, but a longer period of United States employment during the same window can reduce the time available. Executive capacity means directing the management of the organization, setting goals and policies, and operating with wide latitude. Ownership percentages matter more than organisation charts here: the relationship must be one of parent, branch, subsidiary or affiliate, and it has to exist both now and during the period being relied on, which is why an undated chart proves very little. The question is not whether the operation is busy; it is whether the transferee will direct an essential function or supervise professionals and managers. An owner or major stockholder must also show temporary U.S. services and a subsequent foreign assignment.
Managerial or executive, and the seven-year ceiling beyond it
A personnel manager supervises other supervisors or professional employees and controls hiring, firing and performance. The general maximum for managerial or executive L stay is seven years, subject to the applicable rules and individual facts. Use calendars, approval records, budgets, delegation instruments, and descriptions of subordinate functions to show how authority operates. Before deciding to file, map every claimed supervisory responsibility to a dated delegation, organization chart, and the name of the person who carried out the underlying task.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.