Assess each actual role and its qualifying responsibilities instead of assuming a universal one-manager rule.
Explain the real division of authority
Identify what each person directs and how the work is supported. Shared subject matter does not replace evidence of each applicant’s primary duties or automatically mean the positions are identical.
Evaluate each proposed transferee as a separate L-1A applicant. For both people, confirm one continuous year of qualifying employment abroad during the relevant three-year period and a parent, branch, subsidiary, or affiliate relationship, with the foreign organization doing business; for a new-office L-1A petition, that foreign year itself must have been managerial or executive. A non-new-office case must also show the U.S. organization doing business. Then chart which function, department, professionals, or supervisors each person directs, the decisions each controls, and how routine work is performed by others. L-1A requires duties that are primarily managerial or executive; sharing a subject does not disqualify two managers, but duplicated titles and unsupported authority do not prove either role. Also plan within the seven-year L-1A maximum. A new US office receives only an initial one-year period and must have sufficient premises and the financial ability to remunerate the beneficiary and commence doing business, with a plan showing that it will support the qualifying role within one year.
Hypothetical example: A sawmill group near Petit-Saguenay wants to transfer its procurement director and its production director to oversee connected parts of an affiliated US operation. An authority chart assigns supplier strategy and purchasing approvals to one, while the other controls output planning, quality leadership, and production supervisors. Payroll, corporate records, foreign employment dates, and operating evidence support each account. The company avoids claiming that both direct every employee and instead explains the limited decisions they make jointly.