🗣️ What We’re Hearing from Candidates: H-1B Sponsorship
This is the 2nd installment of the What we’re hearing from candidates recruiting blog series where we share what we’re hearing from conversations with job hunting candidates about why they’re looking for a new role right now and what’s important to them.
Over the past two weeks, we’ve noticed a huge uptick in conversations with candidates inquiring about H-1B sponsorship, transfers, and green card petitioning. Typically, less than a quarter of our calls are with candidates requiring sponsorship, but recently that percentage has skyrocketed to a majority. At first, this was a surprising shift, but it began to make more sense given the current circumstances facing visa holders in wake of the recent mass layoffs.
For foreign workers impacted by recent layoffs, the urgency to secure a new position within 60 days to sponsor their work visa or face leaving the country has broadened their search to include smaller, growing companies, in the off chance that they meet the moment by offering sponsorship.
Unfortunately, according to a 2017 study by the National Foundation for American Policy, only 1.6% of H-1B visa petitions were from companies with fewer than 25 employees. While we have been fortunate to work with a few early-stage startups that are willing to offer visa sponsorship, there are a lot of reasons for that low percentage, including:
Having limited resources including the financial and legal capacity to navigate the complex visa sponsorship process.
Needing to focus efforts on developing their product and raising funds.
Having limited bandwidth to handle the additional responsibilities of sponsoring a visa.
Facing the uncertainty of the lottery system put in place because the demand for H-1B visas exceeds supply. Therefore, even if a company wants to sponsor a candidate, there lacks a guarantee.
It is more common for later stage, established tech companies with more resources to sponsor visas for foreign workers, as they have the financial and legal capacity to navigate the visa sponsorship process and are more likely to have a need for specialized talent from outside the U.S.
The candidates we’re speaking to were largely brought to the U.S. to work for one of these big tech companies that were able to sponsor their visa. Those that are now looking for a new job are asking for an H-1B transfer. The process of transferring a visa to a new employer is relatively straightforward. The new employer must file a new H-1B visa petition with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services with specific documentation and once the new H-1B visa petition is approved, the candidate can begin working for the new company.
The next step after the expiration of the H-1B visa is to apply for a Green card, guaranteeing permanent residence status. This process can take several years and involve various steps, including the filing of an I-140 petition by the employer and the completion of a medical examination and background check by the visa holder. Many candidates have shared that green card filing and petitioning support is a non-negotiable in their next company, citing the desire for more stability and less worry in the case of further layoffs.
Sponsorship is a complex, expensive, time consuming process that unfortunately most startups can’t offer. But given everything we’ve learned, it makes more sense to us why these candidates are answering the call.
