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How a move actually runs
From an accepted offer to someone being in the building — and where the time goes when it goes wrong.
The sequence
- Offer accepted. The clock starts, and so does the evidence question. Starting here rather than at filing is the single highest-leverage change available.
- Record assessment. Which routes fit, and which criteria the person can evidence today. This determines the timeline more than anything that happens later.
- Evidence assembly. Publications, press, judging invitations, awards, compensation data — much of it held by third parties you do not control, which is exactly why this stage slips.
- Advisory consultation. Required on the temporary US routes, with its own lead time and a different correct body per discipline.
- Filing and decision. The stage everyone plans for, and usually the shortest.
- Visa, relocation, arrival. Dependant filings run in parallel and in some categories have no premium processing, so the family timeline can exceed the employee's.
- Status maintenance. Renewals and dependant circumstances. A continuing obligation rather than a one-time transaction.
The three things that most often go wrong
Evidence starts at filing, not at offer. Six weeks of drift costs more than the legal fees, because evidence that lives with third parties takes time to obtain and cannot be accelerated by paying for it.
The route is chosen before the record is assessed. Companies often pick a visa based on what they have heard rather than on what the person's record actually evidences. That inverts the order and produces avoidable refusals.
Country of birth is not modelled. Two equally strong hires are not equally fast. A plan that ignores per-country backlogs will be wrong for some of your people for reasons that have nothing to do with merit.