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Over the past 43 years BAL has helped thousands of clients create an immigration program or enhance their existing one. Based on our experience and expertise, here are some considerations as you get started.
We’re sure you’ll have more questions as your program takes shape, and BAL would be happy to help you with proven, real-world answers.
DALLAS, June 22, 2023 – BAL again earned the number one position atop the National Law Journal’s Women in Law Scorecard. This recognition underscores the firm’s ongoing commitment to recruiting and advancing women in the legal profession while fostering an inclusive workplace that enables women to be successful in their careers and in their lives.
“The women at BAL are truly exceptional, and we wholeheartedly celebrate this recognition as the top law firm for women for the fifth consecutive year,” said Frieda Garcia, managing partner of BAL. “As the first female managing partner of BAL, I am so proud that we successfully have created a collaborative culture that brings purpose and balance to our people’s lives.”
In 2022, 64.9% of BAL attorneys were women. Half of the firm’s equity partners were women, with 65.4% of all partners and 62.4% of associates being women. Each of these categories ranked much higher than industry averages in the survey, which were 40% of attorneys, 50% of associates, 27% of total partners, and 24% of equity partners.
For five consecutive years, BAL has maintained its position as the law firm of choice for female attorneys by creating a purposeful, collaborative culture that drives meaningful change. BAL’s innovative talent-development programs and elite performance transformation approach support each team member’s personal and professional goals, and leadership development programs create a supportive environment for people to have more fulfilling careers. Further, the firm’s policies and benefits package reflects its commitment to representation and inclusion.
“Our goal at BAL is to deliver life-changing service to our clients, and we achieve that by working together as one team, oneBAL,” said Jeremy Fudge, BAL’s CEO. “Every person brings their unique strengths, skills and perspectives to the table. Growing representation at BAL, especially at the leadership level, has been key to opening doors for more women to have successful careers and lives. We’re honored to be leading the way.”
The Women in Law Scorecard is an annual ranking compiled by the National Law Journal, which evaluates law firms based on their percentage of female attorneys, including associates, partners and equity partners. The 2022 rankings are based on responses from 257 of the 350 largest law firms by headcount, representing 151,000 attorneys.
About BAL Established in 1980, Berry Appleman & Leiden (BAL) powers human achievement through immigration expertise, people-centered client services and innovative technology. BAL, with 13 offices across the United States and global coverage in more than 185 countries around the world, operates as a single entity through its oneBAL culture — a uniquely holistic approach, intentionally structured as one team, one brand, one P&L, one standard of excellence and one unifying technology. This united approach enables the firm to deliver the highest level of knowledge, insights and resources from across the entire organization. At BAL, we pursue the exceptional. To learn more, visit bal.com.
Media Contact: Emily Albrecht Senior Director — Marketing & Communications ealbrecht@bal.com 469-559-0174
The H-1B visa lottery, unlike cash lotteries, is particularly painful to lose — because the odds of winning are substantially greater, and because so much time, energy and documentation are required to compete. Added to this emotional mix are the professional dreams of the beneficiary, as well as the potential economic impact of winning the lottery and achieving employment goals and financial sustainability. For some, the temptation is to wait out the loss and simply reenter the next pool or hope for second-round selection. However, with H-1B cap selections at a historic low, employers and employees alike should start thinking about H-1B alternatives early. One option is the O-1 visa for individuals with extraordinary ability or achievement.
The O-1 is a nonimmigrant work visa and can be a great alternative to the H-1B cap. There are two types: O-1A and O-1B. The O-1A visa is for individuals who are considered experts in the fields of science, business, education or athletics, while the O-1B is reserved for individuals who have achieved distinction and prominence in the arts. Individuals of all nationalities may apply for an O-1 work visa, and students with advanced STEM degrees or individuals with arts and design backgrounds are ideal candidates.
Unlike the H-1B visa, the O-1 is not subject to a cap. It may also be extended indefinitely and can be filed at any time during the fiscal year.
O-1 visa applicants are required to submit evidence that satisfies at least three of the O-1A or O-1B eligibility criteria. If you are on an F-1 student visa and started temporary employment under Optional Practical Training (OPT) or are in your first year of a STEM OPT, this is a great time to build your O-1 profile. The filing criteria you will have the most ability to control are: original contributions of significant impact, published work, judging the work of others, and awards and grants.
In the face of a non-selected H-1B cap registration, it is important to continue to develop, create and publish your work — especially since it’s one of the criteria options for filing an O-1. Original contributions come in many forms.
For researchers, tangible forms of original contributions include research papers, patents and presentations. Researchers should take advantage of opportunities to publish and submit papers to top journals or conferences in their fields. Research papers need to undergo the peer review process to satisfy this O-1 criteria. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services understands that journals have longer turnaround times than papers submitted for conferences, so focus on the quality of the journals to which you publish over the quantity of publications.
For business professionals, examples include strategic delivery of services or products, key accomplishments considered as significant in their field or novel use of technology in entrepreneurialism. For artists, original contributions are original, novel and creative designs and content.
Continue building upon your accomplishments by publishing and making the tangible forms of your original contributions available in your field to further the area of expertise. Additionally, if your work gains media attention, it may assist your O-1 application. However, you cannot ask a media outlet to cover your accomplishments or events — the outlet must decide to feature you independently. Company press releases, whether original or republished, are considered insufficient evidence for these purposes.
The O-1 guidelines recognize judging the work of others as a step toward establishing eligibility. In order to satisfy this measure, you must judge those who are considered your peers in the same or similar field of your expertise. This may be satisfied by peer reviewing articles for publication in journals or conferences, and by judging scientific, technological or creative competitions.
However, there is a pivotal catch: You can’t solicit an invitation to judge; you must be invited based on your accomplishments in the field. Submitting your work to journals and participating in conferences and competitions will increase your visibility with selection panels and therefore increase the opportunities to receive an invitation to judge your peers.
Joining a conference planning committee is another way to establish O-1 eligibility, especially if you become a conference committee chair or area chair. In this elevated status, you will receive multiple peer review opportunities to establish O-1 visa eligibility under this criterion.
The receipt of awards and grants is another O-1 criterion to consider when applying for an O-1 visa. Submit your work to competitions and exhibitions in your field of expertise with a national or international reach. If you place in the competition, it will not only increase your visibility in the field but also may be another step toward O-1 eligibility.
O-1 guidelines alternatively permit the submission of other evidence to establish eligibility. This may include work you shared online that received viral downloads or impressions.
If you are seeking employment, especially as a STEM student, consider applying to a nonprofit organization or educational institution.
Nonprofits and educational institutions provide opportunities to bolster your O-1 filing, especially if you gain membership in a committee that is applying for a grant. The principal researcher on the committee will receive credit for the grant (which can be used directly toward the O-1 awards criteria), but if you’re not the principal, you can still leverage the grant award to heighten the significance of your original work.
If you are an F-1 student visa holder, you should consider joining a nonprofit — and if you are close to exhausting your F-1 status, you may request having a cap-exempt H-1B visa filed on your behalf. The latter filing will buy you more time to continue your U.S. immigration journey and establish your O-1 eligibility credentials.
The O-1 work visa process is just that — a process. It is incumbent upon you to set aside reasonable time to amass the required evidence. Now is a good time to begin O-1 application preparation, as the process demands supportive documentation.
O-1 petitions require supportive documentation in the form of reference letters. The best strategy is to optimize the downtime following a recent H-1B cap non-selection to build your network of professional contacts and identify your reference recommendations.
Additionally, ask your employment recruiter to request an O-1 assessment for you. If the immigration specialists determine that you do not yet fulfill all the O-1 qualifications as a job candidate, they will typically inform your prospective employer.
Strategically converting an H-1B visa cap loss to a successful O-1 filing takes substantial planning and commitment to ensure success. Further, a successful O-1 filing lays a foundation for green card options for self-sponsorship in the EB-1A or NIW categories. But if you’re willing to stay the course, it ultimately preserves your ability to enter and work in the United States, increasing your odds of fulfilling your closely held employment and financial goals — especially in these uncertain economic times.
Cecilia Lai is a Senior Associate in the Dallas office of BAL. She represents employers whose economic sustainability and growth are dependent upon securing workers through the all aspects of business immigration processes with a specific focus on EB-1A, EB-1B, NIW and O-1 visa processes. She is a member of and past speaker for the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Committed to promoting Asian American awareness, Cecilia is also on the board of directors of the Asian Film Festival of Dallas, a nonprofit organization.
DALLAS (June 8, 2023) — Berry Appleman & Leiden LLP (BAL) has once again been recognized as one of the most diverse law firms in the country.
BAL ranked #3 out of 226 firms on The American Lawyer’s 2023 Diversity Scorecard, including ranking #1 among all firms in Asian attorney representation for the second year in a row and #6 for percentage of Hispanic attorneys.
Over half (55%) of all BAL attorneys — including nearly two-thirds (62%) of equity partners — identify as racially or ethnically diverse.
These figures reflect BAL’s ongoing intentional efforts to cultivate a diverse, equitable and inclusive workplace. DE&I initiatives play a pivotal role in fostering inclusivity, and the firm has enacted several DE&I initiatives in an effort to drive diversity in perspectives, experience and practices.
BAL also conducts internal and external benchmarking to ensure that we are able to attract and retain talent in today’s competitive job market. By embracing DE&I, we enhance our employer brand and make our organization more attractive to diverse candidates. In support of this effort, our recruiting strategy includes efforts to increase minority outreach at Historically Black Colleges and Universities and among other minority student groups, such as BALSA, LALSA and Lavender Law, at universities that already partner with BAL for recruitment.
“At BAL, diversity is more than a talking point,” said Nicole Dawson, Chief People Officer. “Our diversity is one of our biggest strengths. It reflects our inclusive work environment and how we interact with clients and our communities. It is who we are.”
In addition to the recognition from The American Lawyer, BAL was recently honored with an Aspire Diversity Award by Lawyers of Color. The firm ranked #1 in the country for diversity and #1 in equity partner diversity in Law360’s latest Diversity Snapshot and ranked second among law firms in its class in Law360’s Glass Ceiling Report on Women in Law.
About BAL Established in 1980, BAL powers human achievement through immigration expertise, people-centered client services and innovative technology. BAL, with 13 offices across the United States and global coverage in more than 185 countries around the world, operates as a single entity through its oneBAL culture — a uniquely holistic approach, intentionally structured as one team, one brand, one P&L, one standard of excellence and one unifying technology. This united approach enables the firm to deliver the highest level of knowledge, insights and resources from across the entire organization.
At BAL, we pursue the exceptional. To learn more visit bal.com.
Tiffany Derentz is a senior counsel at BAL’s Washington, D.C., office, and member of the firm’s Government Strategies team. She serves on the board of the Immigration Law Section of the Federal Bar Association and is a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Prior to joining BAL, Tiffany served as Deputy Chief of the Legal Advisory Opinions Division within the Visa Office, placing her at the forefront of legal issues impacting all facets of consular operations at U.S. embassies and consulates. She also served as a senior adviser to the Department of State’s Chief Legal Adviser for immigration affairs. In addition to her experience in D.C., Tiffany served as a consular officer at multiple posts overseas, including in the Middle East and Russia. She has direct in-person experience working with consular sections worldwide, the National Visa Center and the Kentucky Consular Center. We recently spoke with her about her work and her take on visa processing and other State Department hot topics.
Consular processing has significantly improved, although if you look at wait times for tourists and business visitors, they are still very long. Take, for example, India: We’ve seen B wait times improve by about 300 days, but they are still around 350 days or more.
Progress has been made in other ways: The State Department expects to fully staff embassies and consulates this year, and they actually processed more visas last year than they had in any year since 2019. The government recently improved administrative processing and gained some other efficiencies. For example, it used to be if you had a case in New Delhi, it would be adjudicated by an officer in New Delhi. Now you can apply in New Delhi and have a consular officer in Frankfurt or the United States adjudicate the application. This flexibility allows the State Department to process more cases for Indian nationals, which is a huge help in reducing backlogs.
Administrative processing is a term the government uses to mean some other action needs to be taken on a case — either the applicant needs to provide something, the consular officer needs to do something, such as get a legal opinion, or additional security vetting needs to be done. For cases that take longer, what you see as a “problem” or delay typically is security vetting. However, now there’s a National Vetting Center these cases are routed through that is supposed to decrease the number of people being flagged for administrative processing, and the vetting itself is taking much less time. Some cases will continue to take longer, but for those who appear for their interview or whose paperwork was submitted through interview waiver from November forward, most of those cases should take about two weeks compared to several months — and, in some cases, over a year — that we saw during COVID.
Prior to COVID, applicants were encouraged to apply for a visa in their home country or country of residence. This helped to reduce “forum shopping,” i.e., applicants trying to find a favorable post. There are also benefits to applying in the home country or country of residence. Consular officers learn the applicant pool and other local customs or conditions, such as what a normal salary is in the local currency and area as well as other factors that can impact visa adjudications.
Then COVID hit, and the government shut down for a few months. When offices reopened, they had a backlog and limited number of officers in key places to adjudicate cases. As visas cannot be adjudicated remotely by officers, COVID limited the number of people who could be in embassies and consulates, as well as in offices in U.S. government agencies that may have a role in the visa process. People had to apply where they were a national or resident because consulates didn’t have the bandwidth to take on extra cases.
More recently, the Visa Office advised consular officers to accept third-country nationals and, in some cases, have opened up appointment availability for certain applicants. For example, Indian nationals can apply in Frankfurt and Bangkok, where appointments have been set aside for them. Not all posts are able to accept third-country nationals though, so it is important to check the embassy’s or consulate’s website.
Yes! Athletes and entertainers are being delayed. For example, there was a big track and field event last summer in Oregon, the World Athletics Championships, which garnered media attention about athletes getting visas just hours before their races and flying to the United States. We’ve seen delays with both large and small sporting events. Over the next decade, that is going to be a particularly challenging issue because there are several major sporting events in the United States, including the Summer Olympics and Paralympics in 2028 and the World Cup in 2026, that will require a very clear and efficient visa process for athletes, coaches and support staff, as well as the fans. You can’t have sporting events without fans. Some of these people will be coming from countries that don’t have visa waiver as an option. In the past, that might have required additional screening, and the government will need to be able to process those in a timely manner to ensure the success of these events.
On the entertainment front, a number of bands have had to cancel concerts due to visa issues.
We don’t know much right now, as the State Department is still trying to decide who is eligible and work through how the pilot will run overall. The pilot is likely to include a small population of Hs or Ls, as they need to be able to test adjudication domestically before they launch a renewal program. They are going to have to collect fees and passports, and have staff to process these cases.
Domestic visa renewal has not been used, except in very limited circumstances for diplomatic and official visas, since 2004 because immigration laws were changed after 9/11. However, a State Department regulation has stayed in place that allows for domestic visa renewal for certain work visa categories — Es, Hs, Is, Ls, Os and Ps. It hasn’t been used in almost 20 years though, so the State Department has to set up an entire office and a new process in order to renew visas domestically. Once a domestic renewal program is launched, it will allow individuals in the United States to reapply for a visa domestically instead of being forced to go abroad. This will also open up more capacity at U.S. embassies and consulates, keeping appointments open to those who need it.
Before I graduated from law school, I was accepted to a fellowship program with the government called the Presidential Management Fellows (PMF) Program. As a PMF, certain government jobs are open to you. I was able to secure a position in the Visa Office. To be honest, I wasn’t looking to get into immigration, but I needed a job before I graduated and the job market was pretty tough. At the time, I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into or what government work was like. My first year in the program, I spent five months at the embassy in Moscow and was involved in planning the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics. My experience in Moscow was a very big, pivotal time for me, both personally and professionally. It was the first of many incredibly unique experiences that only the U.S. government can offer. I’ve been in immigration ever since.
I appreciate being a member of the Government Strategies team because I get to work with incredible people and I can utilize my State Department background in a way that I feel is meaningful. Our Government Strategies team is truly unique. Combined, we have decades of experience in the U.S. government, and more specifically, in the agencies that handle immigration. We’ve been on the inside, so we know how the government works, who the key players are, and have extensive knowledge in immigration. We help our clients navigate complex legal issues and processes, and ensure they understand how changes may impact their immigration programs. Being able to share my experience at the State Department with others in a way that helps our firm and our clients is fulfilling in so many ways.
DALLAS (June 6, 2023) — BAL is once again is a top-ranked immigration law firm in the newly released Chambers USA Guide 2023.
For the 11th consecutive year Chambers has ranked BAL as a Band 1 firm. This year, BAL is one of only two Chambers rated Band 1 immigration law firms.
“BAL LLP is an outstanding team with a stellar track record in the full range of corporate immigration matters,” Chambers said.
BAL’s California, Massachusetts, Texas and Virginia offices are also ranked Band 1 in the 2023 guide. Chambers also recognized 10 BAL attorneys, representing 18.5% of all immigration attorneys ranked by the publication.
“We are honored to be recognized as a Band 1 firm once again,” said BAL CEO Jeremy Fudge, whom Chambers named an Eminent Practitioner of immigration law. “We are especially excited given that Chambers’ rankings are based on client feedback. This recognition affirms BAL’s commitment to exceptional service, investment in our culture and high-performance legal teams that continue to set the standard in our industry.”
In addition to Fudge, Chambers specifically recognized BAL attorneys Ruth Clark, Josiah Curtis, Maria DeLapp, Michelle Funk, Frieda Garcia, Jeff Joseph, Lynden Melmed, Maggie Murphy and Edward Rios. BAL was also ranked Band 1 in Chambers Global: Multi-Jurisdictional Guide 2023 for the United States.
BAL clients interviewed by Chambers provided the following assessments:
About Chambers and Partners
Chambers and Partners is the leading independent professional legal research company, operating in over 70 countries and 200 jurisdictions, that delivers detailed rankings and insights into the world’s leading lawyers and law firms. With an in-depth research methodology involving detailed interviews and analysis of capabilities, achievement and sector presence, Chambers and Partners ranks the best lawyers and firms on the basis of technical expertise, business acumen, prompt delivery and value for money. Lawyers cannot buy their Chambers’ rankings; as a result, its annual directories are considered among the most accurate and reliable.