James Pittman: Welcome to Immigration Uncovered, the docketwise video podcast where we dive deep into the dynamic world of immigration law with the latest developments, cutting edge practice management strategies, and the transformative impact of legal technology. I'm James Pittman, and I have with me Katharine Haight, who is the managing partner of Haight Law Group and the founder of Alista. Katharine, welcome.

Catherine Haight: Thank you so much. It's so nice to be here.

James Pittman: So, Catherine, you're you're a very experienced employment based immigration attorney. You've been practicing this profession for decades. So can we just recap sort of how you got to this point and and what all, you know, how it sort of dovetailed your immigration practice and then your founding of LISTA.

Catherine Haight: Oh, yes. So, yeah, I've been practicing more than 30 years. Started my own firm in 2002, and, really, I'm just kind of a checklist kind of a person. So, you know, beginning of the day, what to get at CVS or or the grocery store or whatever. I'm just into checklists. Like, I find them helpful. And in my practice, I felt that as well. And so we always kept a whole lot of checklist for how to do cases, How to open cases, how to, you know, I don't know, add money to the post machine back when we had to do that, all these little steps, Because recreating them always took so much time. And what I really found in in case processing Was having the steps of what to do in a case really helped us know what to do. It helped us prevent errors. It helped us quickly know where we were on a given case at a given time. And so we kept all of these checklist on Word docs where we always were approving them. You know, CIS changes this or Department of State changes that, and so we just go into our checklist, add a step or delete a step or put it to go to a different place or whatever it was. And we found that our error rate really went down. We could really prevent errors. We really felt that. We had a better communication with our clients because we could so quickly know where we were on a case, etcetera. And best of all was in training. Because when you're training, whether it's an admin, a paralegal, an attorney, You wanna teach them how to do immigration law, how to do a case. And so initial training might be generally immigration, But then how do you do an h-1b? How do you do a perm, etcetera? And so putting these these lists together really helped us get through those various pain points. And what I found was on the case management database systems, whatever they are, they're all missing that piece. And so what I wanted to do was for ourselves, our own firm, set up that piece, how to do a case from the legal side of it, not just fill out a form, but the legal analysis side. And so I just built it within my firm when we worked on it. I mean, we worked on the checklist from, you know, 2002 on, so it's years years years. And then building the Before we started that in 2018, a lot of weekend work and worked with a software developer And then got it up on a platform which was much more useful to us than these old fashioned paper checklists. So that's how it started was really a way to Make our lives easier, and then everything got better. And I would say the one other thing is I in the last probably 20 years or so of of my practice, certainly the last 10. I really like helping and mentoring other attorneys, and so I'm just kind of on a mentor list where people call or email.

Catherine Haight: Hey. How do I do this? How do I do that? And instead of now having to Go through all the different steps. I mean, an h one b case might be a 150 steps or something. I can now direct them. Hey. This is what I used to sit on the phone and tell them about for hours, and instead, now there's a place where they can go, the how to of an l one visa, Send

James Pittman: Yeah. I mean, that is, one of the wonderful things I think about the immigration lawyer community is it's a very open community in terms of mentoring and information sharing. I always found that to be the case. Well, we're gonna look at the features of Alisa, and let's talk about how Alisa streamlines the immigration case preparation process, and and what are its key features? So this is the the first page, you

Catherine Haight: know, the opening page Of Lisa. And do you know that's lista.i0. We couldn't get the dotcom. Lista.com is owned by some kind of a data, like a file cabinet company. I don't even know whether how much longer those companies are gonna stay in in business, but we'll try and get it at some point. But It's Lisa dot I o. And it's just you know, we show the benefits of saving time, reducing error, improving employees and client satisfaction. And I would say that's something else I just wanna jump. Employee satisfaction is really important. The employees don't feel, Oh, what do I do next? What do I do next? I guess I'm gonna bother my supervisor or colleague what to do next. They don't have to do that. They get overall sense of what they're doing, and then there's a step by step process. And so the employees, our employees really feel good using this, and our customers do as well because they're not lagging people all the time. They know what they have to do or can go through it.

James Pittman: Were you a person who was, always tech forward? I mean, were you an early adopter? And did you ever see yourself, you know, did you did you think that founding a a tech product for lawyers was something you'd ever do?

Catherine Haight: I am I'm tech forward. I'm not, like, the best of the best, but I definitely have tech forward. And I I'm someone who, for example, always wants to get the the latest version, and so I have our our tech people you know, if there's now a a 0.6 And we only have the 0.5. Let's get that in. I just feel that all those updates are better. And I would say kinda regularly, though, probably just kind of the norm of people where, you know, this comes along and that comes along, and maybe this could help us, so that could help us. And so I I I'll say I I I wasn't really kind of a tech person in that sense, open to it, but that wasn't, like, You know, my driving force for me, it's always making things easier and better as I go through my workday. And so what can we do to make this easier or better, and that's really what drove it more than kind of a particular ability or skill in tech.

James Pittman: Okay. So this is this is really a very interesting departure for you.

Catherine Haight: Yeah. So go let's let's go ahead. So just, you know, story developing it. Currently, these processes are available. We do have a little movie on the front, but what I'll do is just take you into it. And so this is the main dashboard, and we have active procedures and then templates that are available. You can also I mean, this is I'm signing into, you know, one of mine, but if for somebody new, they can buy the templates, and there's a whole list of them. These all say 0 because I've already purchased them, but, normally, these are a couple $100. Although once you buy 1, And let's say the perm, you know, it shows the most recent update, and we are constantly updating it. And I'll I'll I'll tell you, you know, about kind of how that's done.

Catherine Haight: You can get the most recent version for free after you've already purchased one. So what do these templates look like? So we'll go in and and just look at 1. We can go into, let's say, the h one b. It should be yeah. Let's go in and use an h one b so so you can kinda see what it's like. And so you can add a tag, the company, and maybe, you know, it could be, foreign nationals name. And then as you come down on an h one b processing checklist, recall that in most Case database systems. It's like, what's the checklist for doing an h one b? And and most of those the bigger case management systems, it's like, you know, prepare the case, file the case, get a receipt and then send the approval or deal with the denial, and this is way different. And, again, this is the missing piece to all of that. Although there are workflows in those ones, this is really a very robust version. What do you do with an h one b? Well, first is the attorney assessment. You know, are there maintenance status issues, etcetera? Will they actually qualify? Is it a specialty occupation? And in here then, We have citations to the relevant regulation that's coming through here. And what you're gonna see in all these steps is This is really the legal analysis side. I would say it's really best suited for an attorney or a really seasoned paralegal, because they'll know then, you know, this is what I have to do. I have to do this legal research by going on to the o ONET, online to find out what the classification is. Remote work issues, is there a problem there? Required wage, higher of actual or prevailing wage. I gotta tell you, most attorneys, most immigration attorneys, don't even recognize this distinction and just do the prevailing wage and not the actual wage. We put in the citation that shows you have to really be looking at the higher of these two wages. We also wanna take a look at the very beginning of the case. Is there a future the Green card case down the road that were all of the do you see this is very detailed with the legal analysis of

James Pittman: Yeah. Sure. It's very detailed. I I mean, it seems to me that there's really a tremendous efficiency achieved. You've got both some administrative steps, and you've got legal analysis steps, which means that the attorney does not have to go through and search citations or statutory citations that you should be looking at to make sure that your case is really falling squarely within, you know, the legal qualifications. So, I mean, by by distilling that, you really distill that that lawyer thought process down into a step by step Checklist, and it's it's really invaluable and, I will say, very intelligently done.

Catherine Haight: Thank you so much. And and it's really it's interesting, and I I paralegals are the best. They're amazing. But the reality is that. A lot of the automation tools that are available now really are cutting out the admin paralegal work, But they can't. Those automated tools can't make a decision as to which is the best, you know, way to handle, someone who's gonna be traveling while the h one b is at process or whatever. And I really think nowadays, it's really the legal analysis that is gonna carry a case because there's so many automation tools. As an example, in 1997, I had 10 paralegals for myself. You know, now we have 4 attorneys and 2 paralegals. It's really the structure of a law firm has really changed. And I think what this does is kind of just give an example of how the important issues here And preventing malpractice are are legal issues much more than what it used to be, which was just, you know, making sure you didn't miss a deadline.

James Pittman: And that's a super important point that you just mentioned, and and it's actually that's actually striking to me. You went from 2 attorneys and 10 paralegals to 4 attorneys and 2 power leaks.

Catherine Haight: One attorney and 10 paralegals was what it was in 1997. I had 10 paralegals as a Business immigration attorney. I mean, it's mind blowing now when I think about all the review I had to do.

James Pittman: You had to pay that whole staff to keep the machine running like that. Now what you've got is you've got more earners, the, you know, the people who are really billing, and then you've, by leveraging technology, you've tremendously reduced your overhead. You've tremendously increased the size of your billing engine.

Catherine Haight: Absolutely. Just a couple other things in here. As you work through a case, if there's if you wanna add a note, you can say, I picked, you know, this one or whatever, get it because blah blah blah blah blah. You can throw in a note to your colleague. And also as things are done And you check off something, aside from a cool check I love the way they built this. Boing. It has your name and the date that something was done. And, you know, on an h one b case actually, we'll see and I can show you if perms need it, but those cases can take weeks, months, years, And and a lot of times, you just don't remember what you know, what did I do on that? Why did we do this? And you can go back and find what was done when. And also if there ends up being a problem, you know, you can go back and go, gosh. Did did someone actually do this analysis? Yes. I see that, You know, Kathy reviewed that. Where did the issue come up? Oh, I know. I see now she wrote a a note about a, you know, I don't know what worked teaching piano during f one. What do we do, you know, and kind of how we deal with the the issue on that, whatever it is. And so it's again then easy to see what happened on a case. One of the wonderful things that I love about this is People can go on vacation, and we don't have to worry. We don't have to stress out over where they were on a given case. We can just Pop right in here and see what's been done, how far they got. You know, did we get the LCA back? What's going on. I mean, this is here's the one. Determine required actions for family members. You know, that came up because sometime, You know, 2007 or something. Somewhere along the line, an attorney, could have been me, forgot to analyze the family member issues. Well, that comes back to Hot Shot. Gotta make sure to do that. And as kind of obvious as a step as that was to think I mean, granted, done thousands of cases, but that that was missed at some point. You can't can't do it. So these these checklists are really ways to just make sure That everything is done that you need to to do. And I just you know, actually, I should really show this to my malpractice insurance company because I should get a discount, Thanks.

James Pittman: And have you, I mean, have you received positive feedback, from

Catherine Haight: Oh, yeah.

James Pittman: Drivers? Yeah. I mean, what are some Can you share any success stories or any feedback that you've received?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. Just, Rilad, and I think there's some on the front page of that. You know, people just say it's just so easy to use. And it's been interesting because I thought it would be the more junior attorneys, but we actually have some subscribers who are very seasoned, but they may not really work completely in a certain area. For example, an attorney who's a family based attorney, But wanted to do a TN and thought, you know, I've been doing immigration law for 20 years. I ought to be able to do a TN, but I've never done one before. And she got on. She got the TN template, And she was able to do a t n because she's a lawyer, and she can go through the legal issues, and she could figure out what to do just from looking at this. And so it's that's been an interesting to surprise to see how people who may really concentrate in one area, But are certainly capable of doing a different type of case, can pull this up and then be able to do the case. You know, it's still cases are hard, but it's very doable with this sort of, template checklist. Oh, and one other thing, and I can show you on another one, talk about some other things, is, we do have templates and, you know, samples of documents, attorney cover letters, support documents for oaths, that sort of thing, which then helps people because sometimes you you sit down to write a company letter of support or some sort of letter of support or attorney cover letter, And you kinda don't know where to start. And so having the framework really, really helps with that.

James Pittman: Well, there's a lot of changes that go on in the policies the c's and, regulations. And if you're, you know, citing to different sections and and so forth, I mean, what I'm getting at is, how do you stay updated with the changes in the regs, change some policies so that the templates remain current and accurate?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. And we were just constantly keeping updated whether it's, you know, USCIS policy, Whether it's kind of everybody knows that a certain consulate is you know, does something. I mean, that's a little too specific to this. But we make updates, and I would say, you know, some of our checklists don't need to be updated for a year. Other ones, It might be every few months where something changes or sometimes it's the order of doing things. And so we then wanna move around that, you know, a given step. And I'll just do another share real quick, just to give an example of how that would work. You know, let's say that, I don't know. Down the road you know what? If it got the LCA certifications, when you can go into the templates and change this to be 4 days, Wouldn't that be wonderful if they did them in 4 days? Or on on a on a perm that the, you know, prevailing wage check back in 6 months, you know, have you gotten your prevailing wage yet? If it goes out to a year, we'll make that kind of switch. Or even, you know, along the way, we might I don't know what. And and the other thing is every firm is different. And so I wanna give them one and let me actually just jump up to the templates. First of all, people can create their own, and so you can actually clone 1.

James Pittman: And then you you customize it?

Catherine Haight: Customize it. Exactly. And so we can see yeah. So duplicate it. And then if you wanna then all this, you know, your version of whatever. And you want a few steps in the in the beginning, you can actually then add steps, And I'm wondering if, or let's say move things around. So through here, you can put that, let's say, down here. You know, I can actually add a step. So let's say first, I want to add an extra step. There it is. We're gonna move that up. Because let's say at the front, that just had to do with where the steps were, that I wanna say, you know, give invoice to marry whatever. You know? In other words, at your firm, if you wanna have that in as a step, you can just have all of these different things there for you or your firm. We also do a lot listening to the clients. So if, our customers I have to say, there's not a lot that feedback that we get. I think it's because we used it internally here for so long that it's really been, tested out. But we love hearing from people. Hey. I wanna be able to I think it was through a suggestion they wanted to have a due date on a given procedure. And so if you're, you know, working on a case, Before have any given due date set, so we added that in. Now do

James Pittman: you have integrations with any of the big major calendars like Look or Google Calendar where It

Catherine Haight: does not yet. It does not yet. That's a type of thing that we could add in, and we we're definitely working on that. The south.

James Pittman: Let's say the firm has the one of the firm wants to create a step at the beginning, you know, sign retainer agreement. It said they wanna incorporate their the templated retainer agreement, or they have a memo that they've they have the client sign. So that can be incorporated in?

Catherine Haight: Absolutely. Absolutely. That can be

James Pittman: You started working on this in 2018, and it this, you know, little over a year ago or so that the generative AI really just burst into everybody's consciousness. So has the the dawn of the generative AI has that affected the development of the product? Do you have any plans for incorporating AI related features into it?

Catherine Haight: Not at this point because, you know, I just it's more really a piece, and I think where we're likely gonna do is be able to use this. I mean, really, already immigration attorneys can use this in conjunction with whatever database they're using. And so I think at some point we will likely work in conjunction within, one of these case databases. And to the extent that that they have AI stuff, I think that could work. A lot of that is above my knowledge of tech. So we have, one of my partners in Lisa is a software developer, and so he talks all the the tech talks. So the So far, no on AI, but see what the future brings. I would say it kind of AI goes to kind of the automated piece of all of this. And this of of of, you know, tech in general, this Program is really more the legal analysis side. Certainly, there's a place for AI in that.

James Pittman: The when you yeah. I'm just thinking, you know, just thinking that if you have templated documents, then, you know, you could be, it Popping stuff. Popping things in and incorporating certain research or other auto population features. Yep.

Catherine Haight: Totally. And that should be able to be done, and I think it will be done.

James Pittman: I mean, do you wanna share I I again, can you share anything about, future developments or or direction?

Catherine Haight: Actually, we did setup. We built it in a way that in the future, other people can contribute their checklist. Now we haven't opened that up yet, but what the plan was what is that other seasoned immigration attorneys and how we would kind of be able to Call loads of people and find those people is a different issue. But who maybe could do this in a different area of immigration law than I do? So I'm you know, I wouldn't be able to I don't really even work on anything about asylum or anything. That's scary to me. And I know from my asylum friends, doing a perm is scary. But, so that but we we can, and they will be able to sell their templates. And so we built that in when we built it is that other people could sell their templates, and so that is definitely gonna be a future, feature.

James Pittman: That is great to hear. And how many templates are available currently?

Catherine Haight: Currently, it's 16. I think after this weekend, we'll add at least 1 more. We, like to add 1 a month, but that's been slow because some other things going on right now with respect to development. But we are picking the speed back up on that, And that's something else where we listen to customer feedback. You know, I wanna see the multinational manager template. We might then move that up the list, And so we're finishing this up. Now note that we've already built all of these, but I like everything to be perfect before we launch. So if I'm looking for the is in the wrong place or making sure that the, links are all valid and that sort of thing before they go live.

James Pittman: And are they all employment based immigration, which is your strong suit, or are there any for other areas?

Catherine Haight: No. Just, business immigration. That's my knowledge base. Like, we do have 2 just to show examples, because you can use this platform for other things like onboarding a new employee, offboarding, terminated employee or someone who's leaving. And so you could use it for

James Pittman: a variety of different reasons. So we threw those in to encourage users to Come up with their own checklist as well because they're pretty easy to build. And you described that you got into this because you're really a management and efficiency oriented person. So, I mean, what would be some advice that you would give, let's say, to immigration attorneys who would like to get into, maybe starting their own practice, especially if they're gonna do business immigration in terms of how to think about being as efficient as possible in their practice.

Catherine Haight: Keeping really good notes. Getting lessons learned is a big one. You make a mistake, fix your processes. Setting up processes. I mean, that's really what drives efficiencies are being able to figure out what are our processes this so that each case doesn't have to start from scratch. Okay. What is the intake? How do we smooth the intake? How does it get assigned? How does it get analyzed? How's how does it get processed? And really tracking all of those to dos. Would love it if you use Lisa to do it, but I think that's super, super important. And also having, you know, the most important thing for me and new immigration attorney is Knowing your regulations and having a good set, whether online or paper, with easy to find sites and that sort of thing. There's a lot of good research tools out there, but having that available, and then merging it all together with your processes so that you know how to do things. And even if it's just you and you're not you're you're gonna be a sole practitioner your whole career, having the how to set forth Makes your life easier. You know, for people who have done this a long time, there's always like, wasn't there a case that we did? It was about 5 years ago and blah blah blah. You wanna have a a way to know, how did you do that case? And you can follow that even though you'll be making improvements. So reading the regs, huge. You know, joining an organization. There's so many great ones out there. Ayla is an amazing one because we as attorneys all share and each other. I think that's critical as well. And leveraging technology, you can't I don't I think it'd be very tough to to practice immigration law now Without a a strong database to keep everything together.

James Pittman: Well, you mentioned, your desire to possibly integrate with the case management platform. What are some of the other hoped for integrations that you you you think Lisa might engage in? Calendar?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. I mean, calendar, and I would say making, more robust of the workflows. I think right now, The case database systems have workflows, some triggers that remind you to send out email, and I think a blending Of that would be great. Although I really do wanna listen to admins, paralegals, and attorneys. Do we want them together in one place, or does an admin want a separate one? My belief is it's gonna be that everything together is a way to work. That way you're kind of collaborating in one space. But so I think it's really gonna be building out the at least a checklist with automatic triggers, sending out emails, likely preset that you could always customize. I'm I'm a believer in using templates, But customizing them for every single case. So I I'm hopeful that that's what we can do so it can just go trigger, trigger, boom, boom, going all the way down

James Pittman: a case Within a case management system. And your own tech stack in the office, I mean, apart from a case management platform and, Lisa, are are there, you know, what would be sort of your greatest hits of of technology that you've really found game changing. I mean, I imagine, you know, that hate law, Law Partners is a completely different than when you started it. I mean, Checkout changed so much. And, you know, what would your, you know, your greatest hits be in terms of Yeah.

Catherine Haight: I mean, Adobe has been amazing for us, and and I remember when it first started and you couldn't really do much with it. You just print on a dock. You know? But now being able to manipulate it, I think, is fantastic and the the packaging of our case files. And the other I would say the biggest thing that's been amazing for us is going paperless. We do still have some paper. I still like legal pads with the lines on them and stuff. But, really, it's been a big project and a wonderful project to have, you know, tons of these big file back boxes and over the years, getting rid of them as the case is, you know, after 6 years, we get rid of them or 5 years.

James Pittman: Let's talk about I mean, as an employment based immigration, to what extent nowadays do you think it's possible to, number 1, be paperless, number 2, practice remotely in employment based immigration.

Catherine Haight: Oh, I think both of those very, very doable. You know, unfortunately, with with the government, we still have to largely send paper files in, and they still get lost, whether it's at the CAS or FedEx or whatever it is. But they're definitely I think the government wants to go that way. So

James Pittman: Yeah. They're coming out with the I 129.

Catherine Haight: Yes. And being and we try to do those. We're kind of, you know, early adopters even though, oh, this isn't as good now that I see because you don't get whenever it is time or something like that. But we love to jump on those, government, advances. And I know they've been talking about transformation for probably 15 years, but, I do think the day will come. And, actually, that really ties into one of the important things about LISA. At some point in the future, USCIS is going to be able to connect All of one company's cases and look at them easily or all of a foreign nationals' cases and look at them easily. And so if you have a foreign national who said, oh, yeah. I had this degree back here, and I have this degree, and it's equivalent to this now, and This job requires that. That makes me nervous to have different things in different filings because I think at some point in the future, USCIS will be able to go back and go, what's the deal? You said this on an h, and you said this on the perm, and this on the what the what's going on here? An l one a, then l one b, l one b, l one a, whatever it is. At least to allow you had to think about that as one of the steps is, what is this gonna mean in a current case? You know, how was this case handled before? And I think it's we we believe it's really important To think ahead to the purse until they get citizenship, what is this one filing? What effect is that gonna have on a future your filing. I think that's really critical. It's, again, the legal analysis. It's not just doing a case. It's thinking through the legal strategy for this person way into the future.

James Pittman: Got it. And, so Talk to talk to us about any upcoming initiatives or partnerships, or, let's say, activities that Lisa, the, is engaged. And are you are you out at the conferences, vending at this point?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. We're going around and speaking at the conferences. I haven't gone through the whole you know, set up a whole thing at a conference yet, but, we've, I've gone and spoken at various conferences and and, Done some advertising that way. I think we we launched to the public in September, and it's been fun and exciting to get the little email notices, another customer, another customer and stuff. So, you know, I have to say there's a lot of these pieces that I I'm just an old immigration attorney, and so learning how to market And learning the technology piece and looking for partners. All of that is new. It's exciting. It's fun for me, But I'm not, like, the big experienced person that knows how to do that. I'm I'm winging it and learning along the way.

James Pittman: Well, that's you know, there's a first time for everything. Do you I mean, are you provide do you provide, any training or onboarding support for your subscribers when they when they subscribe to the product?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. When they subscribe, our our VP customer insights contacts a person, let us know if there's anything we can help with, if you have any questions. I have to say it's Pre a pretty easy platform. So we I don't even know if we've had any who said, I don't know how to do this or that. And so but the but that you know, as they're onboarding then, we have direct communication with our customer person so who can then quickly answer questions at any time, either through the contact stream, email, whatever it is, they can contact us. So I would say it's more that we're hearing, you know, suggestions of what do you want next as far as the next template as, rather than any kind of, you know, a technical issue.

James Pittman: Got it. And, you know, a big concern for everybody who's a lawyer, is, you know, the security of their clients' data and their confidentiality. So what measures does Lisa take to ensure security and confidentiality for users and others?

Catherine Haight: It's very, very tight security. I was very much as we were building the platform, form. I we that was critically important. We asked actually also our firm represents, you know, big companies that have sort of every January, this huge security thing you go through. So both our software developer and my IT folks, collaborated to make sure that things were very, very tight. I have to say, I don't understand, again, all those technology issues. I do h one b's for people that understand those issues, but, but I know that that was critically important, in the development of the platform. We're on AWS is the is what is the service.

James Pittman: Okay. Now Besides immigration lawyers and firms or perhaps an immigration lawyer working in house, have you had inquiries from companies who would like to do in house processing of their own visa petitions, and and would you subscribe them? Can they use the service as well?

Catherine Haight: I that's interesting, and I and it definitely would be good. I have to say I don't know because I just haven't looked at our list of of customers, you know, in the last 2 weeks or so. My bet is there probably is at least one out there. But I think definitely it could be. It could be used that if in the house, no, you know, easily. It's a type of thing, and then that way, if they also then use outside counsels for different things, they would be able to show how they worked on a case. I know we do, you know, many a lot of work for for companies that have insight, groups, legal departments, immigration departments, this. And it certainly helps us. So, yeah, it it certainly could be used in house at the big places that do their own, immigration processing. And is there

James Pittman: a way within the platform, for team members within a a law firm to collaborate and communicate with each other while they're working on the case?

Catherine Haight: Yes. Absolutely. So you join as an organization to start, and then you can invite your team members. We charge $20 per person, per seat, per month, and then you buy, templates. And once one person in an organization buys a template, That's it.

Catherine Haight: You that's the only time you have to buy it for the whole organization. So everybody can use that template. Again, if somebody wants to get an updated one, They can see whether it's been updated, and so a colleague in your office can then take it, either use the one that's there, Use your own custom one if you built your own custom one, or you can collaborate. And that's one of the things that we added the notes in so that you can tell your colleague why you did something a little bit odd or provide an explanation to your colleagues. So it's a great tool to know where everybody is on any given case at any given

James Pittman: time. We saw some of the examples. You mentioned perm, h one b. I saw l one a in there. Ken, do you wanna give us a few more examples?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. The Sure. Sure. Of what we have right now, the o's, I know we've built out a lot. Yeah. So hl1a, l1b, o one a. You know, each of these is different. It's interesting because I'm also working on Schedule a group 2, and then I realized there's, like, 4 different Schedule a group 2 cases, And and it's hard to combine them. You really have to make them them, separate. But these are examples. This is funny because this h four I sent them a 60 65 VAD. That's a that's a hard case. It seems like it'd be easy, but there's a lot of steps to proving eligibility. So that's kind of, that's just the fund.

James Pittman: National justice waiver. These are the ones that are available now, and we hope to add, I would say, at least 1 a month, and we'll just keep on adding and growing. And how detailed are, apart from meeting sort of the prongs, the various prongs of eligibility for that categorization. Is there anything else in the analysis about other potential grounds tons of inadmissibility or other things which could derail the case other than, you know, does it meet, you know, the requirements for that visa category?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. I mean, because the I mean, things like this one, it's it sounds silly, but, oh, I don't have to deal with, you know, in a perm in a perm case. I don't have to deal with maintenance of status issues. Yeah. You do. Like, you need to find that out now before you're at the end of the perm case. So it's it's, you know, a lot a lot of detail. Check NIV history. That's something else. You know, you don't wanna get to the I 140 and then realize, oh goodness.

Catherine Haight: They didn't have work authorization for a certain time where they said they worked at this company, but the h approval is for this other company. We wanna straighten that out at the front end. And so these are the this is the kind of detail. But you know what? It's it's where you need to. They're all required to do the case. You have to do all of this kind

James Pittman: of stuff. The checklist sort of, anticipate next steps in the process. Right? Term checklist has things in there that are gonna pertain to anticipating what you're gonna be doing in the I 140 and so.

Catherine Haight: Yep. Yep. The 4 level worksheet. You know, a lot of people kinda like, how do you tell what level? Well, there's a way. There's this thing that came out from Department of Labor that says how to do it now. How would a young attorney who's different than a perm before in a 1000000 years, they wouldn't know what to

James Pittman: do on that. You know, it's just It's very detailed. I haven't, yeah, I haven't seen I haven't seen one that incorporates both the administrative tasks Xandl legal analysis in exactly the way that you have. I mean, can you think of anything else that sets least apart from other tools or software used by immigration lawyers.

Catherine Haight: Yeah. And I I mean, here's on the h one b, I wanted to give an example of the templates. And I think to me so here's a sample letter of support, and so this shows with the little, clip here. And so this is for a change of status or change of employer. This is for an extension of stay, and so it can be downloaded. And we'll see. I wonder when I guess I'll have to do. The Let me just do a quick show. Okay. So this is just a litter head. And I'm kinda the one that I would say to my staff, you know, give me a draft, Put a date on it. I'm good to go. You know? Like, just give me something to go on. So this clearly does that. And this is, again, the kind of thing where we would love to work with the database to get, you know, the little macros popped in that would just pop right in with the petitioning employer's name and the beneficiary's name and that sort of thing. These are all things that could be macroed to pop right in. You could probably pop in a description of the business. I mean, this is really the way USCIS specs to see a case presented. And, again, for a new attorney, they kinda know what to do, but to be able to see that is is, you know, just so helpful to them. So having that ability, I think, is really critical. And I would say in comparison to others, there's others out there, but but they're Pieces of paper. They're Word docs. They're a book. I mean, what are you gonna do? Rip up the book pages and make Xeroxes of it to do the case? I just those are they're they're limiting when they're on a piece of paper as opposed to being on a platform that you can utilize.

James Pittman: Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know, hey. We're long past the the point of doing these things on paper. Catherine, it's a it is a really your creation is an is really a beautiful product. And I think there's been really the the level of, detail and careful thought research, and and, actually, you can see the years of experience, that have been distilled into those very detailed checklists. So I really congratulate you. Now when I when I have guests here on the podcast, I usually do just ask them, and I hope they'll indulge me. I like to sort of get a sense of people as well rounded individuals. It. So I took a look at your LinkedIn profile, and I just wanna hear sort of far from all your work with Leaston and running your law firm, you know, sort of what what else you're you're into, and I noticed some interesting things. You're you're also on the, board of trustees of the Mount Wilson Institute. What's that about? Yes. So Mount Wilson is an observatory up in Los Angeles above Pasadena, where in the 1900, Hubble worked, but also, You know, Manny Mickelson and and, Einstein was

Catherine Haight: up there, and they did some amazing discoveries up there. And I think because of the notoriety of, Griffith Observatory, people forget that Mount Wilson was the one where the real science was done And where we found our place in the galaxy, in in the universe, because it was where Hubble discovered that There is more to the universe than just the Milky Way. And, of course, now from the Hubble Telescope that was up in the, you know, it's been given this amazing information for the last 20 years or so. We've learned that there's billions of galaxies out there. So you can see, I'm excited about this. I love astronomy.

James Pittman: This big cosmology. How did you how did you get into astronomy? Because I'm very into astronomy, and an Gotta you

Catherine Haight: gotta come visit Mount Wilson.

James Pittman: And I I don't I don't really run into that many people in the law who are into that. So how did you come in? Yeah.

Catherine Haight: It was, you know, I grew up in Pasadena, and Pasadena is a a mecca of science with Caltech and and,

James Pittman: the GPL

Catherine Haight: and Carnegie Observatory. And so I was really going to listen to a lecture, you know, from one of Carl Sagan's assistance or something at the Caltech place, with my dad, and we would just listen. And and I just loved all of that. And then Through my participation in things in Pasadena, I was asked to then, do more with respect to, Carnegie Observatories and then to be on the board up at Mount Wilson. We love and we're gonna continue to work on bringing Mount Wilson really to the world because it's an amazing place with an amazing scientific history. And so it's it's something near

James Pittman: and dear to my heart. Well, I absolutely next time I'm out in that area of California

Catherine Haight: Don't know.

James Pittman: Because I'm totally into astronomy and cosmology, and, I I really need to see this place. It's so great to to Now

Catherine Haight: are you Are you gonna be able to see the eclipse then? Because it's not gonna be on our side of the country. It's in April 8th, I think it is, so you gotta find a place to drive the

James Pittman: liminal check I will check it out.

Catherine Haight: The cool glasses to be able to see it.

James Pittman: And then you're you're so on the board of directors of the Academy of Magical Arts. So that's a private club dedicated to promoting the art of magic. I mean, where how to get into that.

Catherine Haight: That's so funny. It's the other side of my personality, I guess. Science and Earth. And I'm no longer I was on the board of directors 4 I think four and a half years or so. But it's just a fun place. I love, you know, that that type of art, magic. I just I even as a kid, I just loved it. I'm not myself a performer. I just love to watch it and to see the artistry of how it's it. It's done. It's just so interesting and fun and fabulous and awesome. And so I became a member of the Magic Castle many, many years ago, decades, And then, did a lot of volunteer work there and then was elected to the board of directors, actually, three times. And then that's that's a that's a a tall order, though. So with everything else going on, I'm still a member. I I'm actually going Monday night, and so that's something else we can do when you come into Los Angeles, James.

James Pittman: For sure. For for sure. And and, you know, I you're so busy with Liza and with running your firm and and with these other interests. I mean so I always try to ask people, so what are your tips for wellness and balance in your life? How do you how do you manage being a successful attorney with a a product that you've now started and and and staying, you know, staying healthy and taking care of yourself?

Catherine Haight: Yeah. So I I love exercise. So during COVID, I built a little gym in my in my, garage. I can now call it a rec room. And so, you know, a lot of strength in Peloton, hiking, biking, swimming. I just love all of that type of exercise. I I clearly, there's some chemical that makes you happy after you work out, or at least for me, and so that's wonderful. And then, you know, really having some downtime. And so saying no and and, you know, unfortunately, saying no to some things so that I can have downtime and spend time quietly with my family or, cooking or whatever it is to really have some of that zen time. And I also I love watching sports too. So I'm I'm a sports nut. We do a lot of sports cases at my firm. So whether it's watching or participating, I'm all into sports. So it's great

James Pittman: to hear. I I really love hearing how people, well, you know, sort of, incorporate wellness, take care of themselves because you have to recharge. You have to in order to be able to come to things with a fresh mind, it's about taking care of yourself and and having boundaries and having balance. So yep. So love love hearing it. Catherine, it's it's been a fascinating discussion. I've really enjoyed having you and loved looking at Lisa. So I wish you the absolute best with it, and I'm sure we're gonna keep following you and see seeing how it develops, and and, really, good luck with continued development of the product.

Catherine Haight: Thank you so much, and thanks so much to the nation. So thanks for what you do as well.

James Pittman: You're you're very welcome. I appreciate that.

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