Graham Adair Inc.

In early October, when Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte told President Barack Obama to "go to hell" and threatened to "break up with America" amid strains on the countries' long alliance, Chad M. Graham and Sam K. Adair quickly noticed a negative effect on their business immigration practice. "Suddenly, no more visas," Graham said of the normally free-flowing process that let Philippines citizens move easily to jobs in the U.S. "Nobody said it overtly, but we suspect the political situation is to blame. And we have a major client with operations here that needs those workers."

Keeping an eye on politics and government policies abroad is part of the job for Graham and Adair as they ease the visa process for clients importing foreign workers to the U.S. and facilitate the movement of workers among businesses in countries overseas.

Their firm, launched in 2010 with Graham, Adair and one paralegal, now numbers eight lawyers and a dozen support staffers. "Our revenues have grown by double digits every year," Graham said. "The first year it was just over $600,000. Last year, we brought in nearly $2.9 million, and this year, we project it will be $3.6 million." The firm represents mainly high tech and biotech companies in the Bay Area, including robotic operating room equipment maker Intuitive Surgical Inc., online document supplier LegalZoom.com Inc. and genetic sequencing technology company Illumina Inc.

Graham said he and Adair have developed links to law firms in more than 100 countries that can assist locally to prepare visa and work permit applications for employees in any of those nations and send them to any other place where they want to do business. "This year alone, we helped three of our clients start sending employees to offices in the Asia Pacific region and all over Europe," he said. Those host countries include Australia, Japan, China, Sweden, Germany, France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Russia, South Africa, Mexico and Brazil, he said.

That's a daunting list of immigration laws and practices to keep track of. "Our network of partners makes it work," Graham said. "U.S. immigration laws are way more complicated than they should be. Australia is pretty bad, and the Asia Pacific countries can be hard. But we're No. 1 in complexity."

Graham is a fan of software that helps build in efficiencies when confronted by the tedious task companies face completing questionnaires and documents to get visas and permits. "We are working with a software-based human resources outsourcing company to automate the visa application process," he said. "These geniuses can pull out HR data as auto-populate the necessary forms. We strongly believe it will create disruptive innovation in the business immigration industry. It will enable companies to move employees quickly through the paperwork and government submission process by leveraging information already contained in company databases, resulting in significant savings."

His firm works on the individual level as well. "An example was a doctor from Malaysia who was involved in research into potential cures for pancreatic cancer," Graham said. "She had come to the U.S. on a J-1 visa, which would have required that she return to her home country for at least two years, interrupting her important research." Graham explained the situation to his local congresswoman, Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose, who interceded with the State Department on the doctor's behalf. "After many months and a lot of conversations, we were able to secure a waiver for her, and she is currently in the U.S. doing her research."

Graham Adair emerged from the Great Recession. Both men were working as associates at Littler Mendelson PC's business immigration practice group when the nose-diving economy forced that firm to first consolidate the practice group and then eliminate it almost entirely, Graham said. "Sam was in India, opening a Littler office in Bangalore. I was in Phoenix. The firm moved us both to San Jose, then decided to either move us to labor and employment work or let us go. We decided to strike out on our own."

It was a bold but somewhat intimidating move, Graham said. "A little scary. Sam had some experience in setting up an office in India, but we had to learn as we went along. Part of the challenge was convincing current clients that were should remain their lawyers." Recently, he said, his company went head-to-head with Littler in filing submissions in answer to a company's request for proposal. "We got the business over Littler," Graham said. "That was very satisfying."

— John Roemer