Do not decide continuing business from one isolated month. Assess the actual operations and required qualifying conditions over the relevant period.
Explain the business rather than invent activity
Identify real services, customers, staff and ongoing responsibilities, including what occurs between larger projects. A company registration alone is not doing business, and fabricated invoices are not an appropriate response to a gap. The proposed U.S. role must still be primarily managerial or executive, with qualifying related entities and the required foreign employment.
The maximum periods are cumulative within the same maximum-stay period, so a person who spent two years in the group's American operation in a specialised knowledge role has used part of the allowance unless a qualifying immediate prior year abroad makes a new period available. Multiple sites help only if the transferee is chiefly setting policy, approving budgets, directing subordinate managers or professional staff there, or managing an essential function at a senior level with discretion, rather than personally covering the floor. Personnel management rests on supervising and controlling professional or supervisory staff; function management rests on managing an essential function at a senior level, which can fit a family business where the person owns purchasing, credit or service delivery without a large team beneath them.