It is insane. Despite getting in by April 1st we're now waiting on the lottery results to see if our first engineering hire can stay in the country. It's going to be extremely disruptive both to him and to us if he can't stay. Stupid.

Is the distance between him and your team really going to be that disruptive if he/she needed to work from another country?

Seriously people; this is Hacker News. We build things on The Internet. Since when is distance an acceptable excuse of a limitation for team members?

You'd be surprised by the number of technology companies big and small that can't wrap their heads around remote workers.

What's insane is that your company doesn't allow him to work remotely.

What if he doesn't want to work remotely though?

When you go to school in the US and then get a job, you build a network of both personal and professional relationships, you get settled in a place, etc. Why should someone who's actively contributing to the economy be forced to throw that away?

I'm in the same boat as OP's colleague. Graduated from a US grad school, now working in SF with an apartment, furniture, friends, a girlfriend, a professional network, etc. The company I helped start has created 4 jobs in the last month or two, with many more to come.

And now I'm in a lottery against some large companies who view the visa as just an opportunity to place cheap labor.

How is that fair, sane, reasonable or sensible in any way?

If & when the immigration overhaul happens in Washington, I believe this is slated to get fixed -- higher ed students at US institutions would have an automatic path to permanent residence after graduating.

I haven't followed the immigration reform process since it first broke a few months ago, but as of January the proposals definitely included something addressing this.

I had heard second-hand that international employees of reputable companies like Google etc. have preference for H1-B applications or for Green Cards, I forget which. But in case you happen to be working for a (large) well known company, there is a chance that the immigration team could leverage this (if they aren't already) for your co-worker.

We're waiting on the lottery for now, and have our legal team and friends thinking about what to do otherwise.

We're a relatively small company (~75) company, so it's quite disruptive.

Is there much to be done, except for the OPT extension?