Past work in a family enterprise can demonstrate experience, but it does not establish current U.S. employment permission. Assess the spouse’s present status and the work now proposed.
Date the experience separately from the intended start
Use previous employment records to explain what the spouse actually did and when. Then identify the location and duties of the new role, alongside the current status documents. A qualifying E spouse may work incident to valid status with appropriate evidence; a former family-business title cannot supply that status. E dependents generally must be a spouse or an unmarried child under 21, and children do not inherit the spousal work benefit. If old letters describe the person as already managing the business, clarify whether that means historical Canadian work or the future U.S. proposal rather than carrying the earlier description forward unchanged.
The principal is in a different position: because the requirement is to develop and direct the enterprise, a principal working full time elsewhere raises an obvious question about who is running the business. Dependant status ends on the twenty-first birthday, and because this classification offers no direct path to permanent residence, there is nothing for a young adult to inherit by waiting.