IN THIS GUIDE · A registered forester whose American offer has been written up as a purchasing job
Start with the TN eligibility and application overview
His registration answers half the test and nothing more
Two findings have to be made, and they are made about different things. The first is about Wendell: does he satisfy the Forester entry's own requirement? A forestry degree, or provincial registration in good standing, disposes of that question, and he can evidence both. The second finding is about the position: does the American job require and consist of professional forestry work? Negotiating stumpage, chasing haulage and hitting a monthly volume target is commodity purchasing. Nothing about it is disreputable, and it may pay better than the work he does now, but a purchasing role does not become professional forestry because the person filling it is a forester. Officers read the described duties and compare them with the listed profession, not with the applicant's resume.
Procurement can be professional work, depending on what is actually in it
Log buying at a hardwood mill often does contain genuine forestry. Someone has to walk the stand before an offer is made, estimate merchantable volume by species and grade, judge whether the site can carry the harvest being proposed, and advise the landowner on residual stocking and regeneration. Where those tasks are the substance of the job and the price negotiation is the consequence of them, the position is defensible. Where a technician does the cruising and Wendell only signs cheques, it is not. The distinction cannot be manufactured after the fact by an adviser rewording a letter; it has to be what the mill genuinely wants. The honest way to find out is to ask the hiring manager how a February week would divide between the woods and the phone.
The convenient invoicing arrangement would sink the whole thing
To avoid setting Wendell up on American payroll before the mill's fiscal year closed, the company suggested he bill his first months through the forestry consultancy he already operates from home. That suggestion has to be refused. Self-employment in the United States is not permitted under this admission. He must be employed by, or under contract to, an American entity that controls the work he performs, and an arrangement where he sets his own hours, carries his own tools of trade and renders monthly invoices from a Canadian corporation reads as exactly what it is. The company also floated a small equity stake as a retention incentive; any ownership interest must be disclosed, and it is examined for whether the relationship is genuinely employment rather than a business of his own.
Four questions worth asking before a support letter is drafted
Ask the mill to state, in hours, how much of a normal week is stand assessment, prescription and landowner advice, and how much is negotiation and logistics. Ask who signs his pay and who supervises his day, because those answers ought to be the same entity. Ask whether the offered equity is a genuine share and, if so, its percentage and voting rights. Ask what happens to the role once the yard is full in spring, since seasonal industries reshape jobs quietly and a description written in November may not survive to April. The answers determine whether this is an application worth making or a job worth renegotiating first.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.