Inside the H-1B program: One employer speaks out

Few topics in IT are more polarizing than that of the H-1B program, which allows foreign workers to take skilled jobs here in the U.S. if an employer can demonstrate that it is having a hard time filling those job roles.

 

Last week the government opened and closed the window of opportunity for companies to submit applications for H-1B workers. The government currently allows 65,000 H-1B workers annually, and the program enables those workers to stay for up to six years in this country working on that visa. Congress is debating allowing up to another 125,000 visas under the program for 2014, a move which occurs on an almost annual basis now.

While a dozen or so large employers take the lion's share of the H-1B visas, there are countless smaller firms that employ just a few H-1B workers. FierceCIO spoke with Giorgos Zacharia, chief technology officer at travel search engine company Kayak, in Concord, MA, about the company's experience with hiring just a half dozen H-1B workers at a time.

(Read my complete article at FierceCIO)