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Roman Zelichenko
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Roman Zelichenko, JD, is a multifaceted professional whose career journey has transitioned from practicing immigration law to empowering immigration and global mobility firms and founders through technology, marketing, and content strategies. With a background in JD in Immigration Law from Brooklyn Law School, BS in Financial Economics, and a BA in Philosophy, Politics, and Law from the State University of New York at Binghamton, Roman has developed a diverse skill set. As the Co-Founder & CEO of LaborLess, Roman has introduced a platform aimed at automating LCA posting and PAF management for immigration lawyers and in-house teams across law firms and organizations of all sizes. Additionally, he founded GMI Rocket, a digital marketing agency specializing in the immigration and global mobility industry, providing services like social media management, creative content creation, event organization, and a podcast. Roman is also a dynamic speaker, presenting on immigration tech, marketing, and branding at various prestigious events and platforms like AILA, SHRM, ERC, BAMM, law schools, and podcasts.
Highlights
A lot of US immigration folks are talking about the proposed higher visa application fees, but to me, the most consequential proposal is to the H-1B REGISTRATION fee. Here's why.
When the H-1B registration system took effect in 2020, it drastically changed the H-1B process.
Gone were the days of April 1st insanity where 200,000 fully prepared H-1B applications were FedEx'd to USCIS to get "into" the lottery.
Suddenly, it was simpler: pay $10, fill out some basic information, and you're in the running for a drawing in the H-1B lottery. If you're selected, THEN you can prepare and submit a full H-1B application.
Yes this caused confusion at first, there were some glitches, and it had the impact of dragging out "cap season" across months.
But the biggest impact, I believe, is that it suddenly made it much EASIER to throw a prospective H-1B worker's name into the lottery. Indeed, since 2020, H-1B registrations shot up.
FY 2021: ~275,000 H-1B registrations. FY 2022: 308,613 H-1B registrations. FY 2023: 483,927 H-1B registrations.
Now, USCIS is looking to increase this registration fee from $10 to $215 (a whopping 2050% increase!!).
In my view, this is going to be really consequential for a few reasons:
🎲 INDIVIDUAL: BETTER CHANCES OF BEING SELECTED
Since the total number of cap-subject H-1B slots has remained at 85,000 per year, as registration numbers went up, the chances of being selected went down. More expensive registration = likely fewer registrations = lower "denominator" in the H-1B likelihood equation with a constant numerator = higher chance of being selected.
🇺🇸 POLITICAL: THIS LOOKS BETTER FOR US IMMIGRATION
As the chances of getting selected got lower and lower, this was blasted all over the news. Companies wanted better numbers to be able to rely on the H-1B program, international students wanted better assurances of the value of investing in a US education, and politicians fought over the best way to solve this problem. Better H-1B chances = less fighting!
🌎 GLOBAL: WE WANT TALENT TO COME TO THE US!
In response, at least in part, to our increasingly embarrassing H-1B numbers, int'l students and skilled workers started looking to other countries that provided higher chances of getting work authorization. From Canada to the UK to Australia and others, over the past few years, other countries have flexed their immigration muscles seemingly in response to the US failing to do so. Better H-1B chances = more talent coming to the US! . . . . Thoughts on this?
Thank you Lubna Kably and The Times Of India for your consistent reporting on US immigration!
#h1bvisa #immigration #immigrationlaw #globalmobility #relocation
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Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
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Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
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Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.
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