L1, L2 Visa

I went through about 50 pages of the immihelp experience, did mock interview for 1+ week and I must say it paid really well. The below write-up is a return of favor...

THINGS THAT MATTER MOST FOR L-1A interview

VO's job is to ask you all the questions and put "tick marks" against them, - more number of "ticks" you get (or less "cross"), better the chance of your visa approval ..(like US driving licence test), - so if someone says "salary doesn't matter" because his visa got approved even with low salary, then that's a wrong judgment, - may be there were other points in his application which helped him, which may not be true for you if you have a low salary coupled with less number of team at onsite, or any other negative point. So anyway, here's the things that matters according to me. It's not a legal advise, but it's what I have realized after reading all the threads applying a sense of logic.

1. Onsite Salary - I think it matters the most, anything above 100K is good. Think like this, a dishonest petitioner and employee can fabricate everything (e.g. team etc), but they can't fabricate the salary. So it's logical for the managers, who are senior persons in the org, to get well paid. So a good salary helps and VO's like that.

2. Team structure - If you are not a "functional manager" having > 10 people in your team structure helps, and you must have 2 level hierarchy.. just 1 level is not good enough.

3. Your reporting manager NOT at client site and managing multiple clients - If it's a client based role, then your manager shouldn't be managing same client, as it makes you NOT the senior most person in the account. Now, is L-1A only applicable for senior most person in the account ? NO, but this is a logic that plays in the VO's selection criteria as the "invisible" bar is raised now, and they get a feel of you being a junior manager at the client side, and I have read several rejection experience only because of this reason.

4. Confidence - this matters a lot, but I had a weird problem. I'm a fairly confident person, I have 16 years of IT experience, managed projects in EU and US for 10+ years and worked for couple of most respected IT companies in India, but when I read in Immihelp every one is asking people to be confident, - it made me think, am I confident enough ? It was a weird thing that when someone asks you to do something again and again, you think may be you are not doing it right. Don't let this happen to you, but if it does, keep practicing. I had practiced for about 1 week with mock interviews with myself in mirror and my wife. I made an excel with the list of questions and their answers. This is very important.. it helps your confidence.

5. Your past history - This is just my idea. If you went to US before, I think they check all such info based on your SSN and if they dont find anything negative for you, they feel more comfortable giving you a visa as compared to someone that they never issued a visa before. But normally anyone with L-1A is a senior person and has traveled to US before... so I guess, it's not an issue anyway.

6. Educational background - again you have no control over it, but higher education helps.

Now, if you don't meet any of these criteria, will your visa get rejected ? Probably not as the pass marks probably is 80% and not 100%, but I'm pretty sure if you have got all of them your visa WILL be approved.

THINGS THAT DO NOT MATTER

1. Dress - I have suits, and I even ironed them for the interview, but eventually I didn't wear them for the following reasons. My friends told me about 5% people wear suit (it's end Feb and pretty hot by now) - so I decided to NOT wear it, because if I wear it, I will stand out in the crowd, the VO may like it, or may not like it.... or may be it won't matter, but in every case, not wearing it, and going with the crowd is a better decision than wearing it, and feeling hot or stuffy or even make the VO think you are dressing well only to hide your competency. A couple of guys were wearing suits, and I could clearly tell that they looked more nervous... I dont know if it's because they were feeling hot, or they were just not good enough... but please don't wear extra stuffs, wear formals as if you are going to office.

2. Your offshore team structure - I rarely saw anyone asking this question, and it doesn't matter at all. All the VO cares about is your US team structure.

NOW HERE'S THE INTERVIEW WITH MY VO.

Most of others dont give answers, but I will write them also so that you understand how those influence the decision..

VO: Are you applying L-1A blanket or Individual?
Me: It’s L1A Blanket

VO: Who is your employer?
Me: YYYY (Sorry I can't disclose my employer's name, it's Indias one of the most respected IT company)

VO: What is your designatio?
Me: YYY (I can't disclose this also as then you may guess my company name :) .. but my designation has no "manager" or "director" word in it... so probably it's another thing that doesn't matter.

VO: Are you going to a client site ?
Me: Yes, gave the client name + location

VO: How many direct reportees ?
Me: 8

VO: How many indirect reportees?
Me: 6

VO: All at onsite?
Me: Yes

VO: Do you have hiring and firing authority?
Me: Yes mam.

VO: What would be your salary?
Me: Answered (it's above 150K)

VO: What is your highest qualification?
Me: Bachelor of Engineering

VO: What would be your duties ?
Me: Answered in 3-4 sentences the following keywords (program management, delivery, budgeting, roadmap planning, resource management, client relationship management, business growth)

VO: When did you get married?
Me: Answered

VO: What is the date of birth of your daughter.
Me: Answered

VO (to my wife): What is your highest qualification?
Me: Bachelor of Engineering.

After some typing, "Your visa is approved"

She was typing and talking, and while everyone in the forum said, maintain eye contact, I sometimes felt a bit odd staring at her eyes while she was typing, so I kept a mix of eye contact + watching the wall etc :) ... but she never asked me any question looking at my eyes, she was mostly on the computer.

Hope this helps.