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Wednesday, April 04, 2007
This is NOT how it's supposed to work
#ifdef
ANGRY_RANT
Until the end of September 2006, we had a person on our team
here at SourceGear. Let's call her Jane.
Jane was an extraordinary employee. She worked in QA
as part of the Vault development team. Her coworkers described her in very
positive ways, sometimes using superlatives.
So what happened -- did she leave SourceGear for a better
job? Nope. In fact, Jane isn't working at all right now.
Jane is from India. She was working for SourceGear on a J-2
visa, which is basically "the spouse of someone with a J-1 visa".
Unfortunately, her husband's visa changed from J-1 to H-1B (which happened
because he works for the University, which is exempt from the H-1B limits). The
spouse of a J-1 is allowed to work. The spouse of an H-1B is not.
We've been told that the only way for us to rehire Jane is
to get her an H-1B visa of her own. The deadline for submitting applications
was Monday. For uninteresting reasons beyond our control, we didn't even
submit an application. And if we had, there is apparently a good chance we
would have been denied anyway. Only 65,000 slots are available and the
government received 150,000
applications. A lottery will be used to decide whose applications are to
be accepted.
I know the H-1B issue is controversial. Public discussion
of the topic tends to include emotionally charged phrases like "indentured
servitude" and "taking jobs from Americans". I don't really know the
subtleties of this debate, nor do I care. Jane wants to work for SourceGear.
SourceGear wants to rehire Jane. None of this has anything to do with saving
money by hiring cheap foreign labor into a life of bondage. When we originally
hired Jane, she was selected from a pool of over 30 applicants. The fact that
she is not a U.S. citizen was irrelevant. She was paid a fair salary and
bonuses according to the same structure as every other member of our team.
Everything was completely legal, and she turned out to be an outstanding hire.
We lost her because of a stupid technicality.
I don't think this is how it's supposed to work.
#endif
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