If only it were that easy.
Building a successful export operation involves harnessing the talents of many people in all areas of your company. Exporting introduces unique challenges—regulatory compliance, documentation, international logistics—that go beyond your typical domestic operations. That’s why it’s essential for every team involved to understand how their responsibilities contribute to the bigger export picture.
With that in mind, here are six areas of your company that need export training—along with the type of information they need to understand.
Your sales team is undoubtedly a crucial part of making your business run, but if they aren’t properly trained in export procedures and compliance, they may be making promises to international customers that your company can't keep. There are certain export-related topics they need to understand.
Your sales team needs to understand the technical specs of the products you’re exporting. For example, will the product you’re selling in the U.S. even work in the country you’re shipping to? Is it 110-volt or 220-volt? Overlooking these details can lead to costly returns, dissatisfied customers or lost sales opportunities.
Incoterms define if the exporter or importer is responsible for various costs, risks and responsibilities during the shipping process. If your sales team doesn’t understand Incoterms, they could agree to a sales term that shifts too much cost or liability to your company—erasing any profits you might have made.
Your sales team should know Harmonized System (HS) codes for the items you’re exporting. Depending on the Incoterms used, ignoring the HS code could cost you money if your company is responsible for customs clearance in the country of import. And even if you aren’t paying duties and taxes, misclassified products can be held up in customs, delaying delivery and payment.
Not every U.S.-made product can be exported without restrictions. While items with military application are the most obvious example, even some commercial goods are controlled. These are called dual-use items, and the Export Administration Regulations may restrict their export depending on where the goods are being shipped. At the very least, your sales team needs to understand the fundamentals of export compliance as outlined in our free guide, What You Need to Know About Export Compliance.
Like all areas of business, it’s the leadership of the company who set the priorities and model the attitude employees will develop toward exporting. If the top executives are not fully behind an export initiative, it will not have the time or resources necessary for success.
Likewise, if the CEO, president or other top managers don’t make export compliance a priority, no one else will. The Office of Export Enforcement starts almost every one of their presentations by highlighting companies that failed to take compliance seriously and suffered substantial fines—and damaged reputations—because of neglect. Your management team needs to understand the risks of exporting.
In the mythology of exporting, there is an almost romantic notion of the guy who can bypass the hurdles and frustrations of international trade by greasing a few wheels, buddying up to the right people and making problems disappear. Today, that approach is not only outdated, it's dangerous and illegal.
Starting with the very top of the company, everyone involved in international trade needs to be aware of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), which restricts payments or favors to foreign government officials. Investigations into and penalties for FCPA were at an all-time high in 2024 and include not only employees of companies, but also their agents, partners and affiliates located within or outside the United States. Though enforcement is expected to slow under the current administration, anticorruption regulations in other global markets mean these rules still likely apply to your business.
In exporting, you can do everything yourself; you can hire vendors like freight forwarders to take care of parts of the process for you; or you can do a combination of both. No matter how you do it, you have to actively manage all the pieces of the process—especially export compliance. If your managers are not making export compliance an important part of your exporting process, you’re risking a lot. For examples of risks and the penalties for each, download the Bureau of Industry and Security’s guide, Don’t Let This Happen to You!
Under U.S. export regulations, an export is any item sent from the United States to a foreign destination, organization or individual. The item may or may not be a physical good; it could include technology or software. An export also includes the transfer or disclosure (visually, electronically or in any other medium) of technologies or technical data, as well as consulting, instruction, training or lectures, concerning export-controlled equipment, materials or items to a foreign entity or individual within the U.S.
That’s right. You can be an exporter without shipping goods outside the country. Management needs to understand this concept and ensure your company has the proper procedures and controls in place so this doesn’t happen.
Expanding into global markets adds additional challenges for your accounting department. The standard ways of doing business domestically become inadequate or simply won’t work when dealing with international markets.
Trade terms commonly used in the U.S. will not be recognized abroad. Managing foreign currencies, navigating international banking systems and handling new documentation requirements can overwhelm accounting departments that aren’t prepared. Many accounting and ERP systems are heavily geared toward domestic business and may require upgrades or customization to support international functions.
Your chief financial officer, controller and accounting department need to understand important differences in international trade.
Incoterms define which party—buyer or seller—is responsible for costs, risk and obligations at different points in the shipping process. These terms have financial implications beyond logistics. They impact insurance requirements, payment responsibilities and even revenue recognition.
It’s essential that your accounting department understands Incoterms, how they relate to shipping documents, and how they influence contract terms, payment timing and liability.
Unless you are a charity or a government agency, getting paid is the most important part of exporting. If you’re not going to get paid, why bother? Understanding and evaluating the risks and rewards of using letters of credit or other payment options is crucial for your accounting department. We have published scores of articles on letters of credit and related payment terms that will help your company balance the risks and rewards of various payment options.
Your accounting team must assess not just buyer creditworthiness but also country risk, including political stability, currency volatility and regional regulations. Our free guide, Evaluating Export Markets: How to Assess Country and Customer Risks, walks you through how to properly evaluate potential export markets and customers so you don’t put your company at risk.
When companies expand into exporting, the shipping department is often the first team affected—but not always the first to receive the resources or training it needs. Exporting doesn’t just mean shipping more products. It means facing new regulations, documentation requirements and logistics challenges that domestic shipping doesn’t prepare you for.
While your domestic and international shipments might use similar modes of transport, exporting often introduces new shipping methods and service providers. Your team must understand the full range of international options—air, ocean, courier, multi-modal—and the pros and cons of each. Check out the articles on international logistics that we’ve written for the International Trade Blog.
While your shipping department might have some experience completing a bill of lading for your domestic shipments, international shipments come with a stack of additional export documentation requirements—commercial invoices, packing lists, certificates of origin, and more. (Library of free export form templates here.) In addition, you may need to file your electronic export information (EEI) through the Automated Export System (AES).
Download the free Beginner’s Guide to Export Forms to get an understanding of the various export documents that may be required. You also need to understand how time consuming it can be to accurately complete the paperwork without a software solution to help. Watch this quick video to see how some of the most successful exporters meet this challenge:
Your shipping department needs to know how to work with freight forwarders, customs brokers and carriers. They also need to understand that insurance requirements may be different in each transaction. Don’t forget, just because a freight forwarder is a partner doesn’t mean that they’re wholly responsible for your export compliance. You can outsource responsibility, but you can’t outsource liability!
Depending on where in the world you plan to export, you may need to accommodate different time zones and different languages. While you may have addressed these issues with your international sales department, companies don't always initially consider how it will impact their customer service representatives.
Depending on what you sell, you may need a plan for handling customer service issues for your international customers. Do your products require installation and regular maintenance? Do your products or their parts need to be regularly repaired or replaced? Do you typically provide phone support or other live support options for your customers?
Depending on how you answered these questions, your customer service representatives need to understand the culture of the people they will be supporting, the process for legally and affordably sending repaired goods and replacement parts to foreign customers and restrictions on sharing information and controlled technology with foreign nationals.
If your products typically require on-site installation and servicing, your service people need to know how to travel with the tools and equipment they need to use when visiting foreign customer locations.
In many companies that export, the customer service department is responsible for preparing key export shipping documents. If that’s the case in your company, your customer service reps need to understand how to determine what documents are required and how to complete them accurately. (For help with this, download the free guide, The Beginner’s Guide to Export Forms.) Missing or inaccurate documents can slow the delivery of your goods or, worse yet, slow payment for your export shipments.
Customer service reps must also be familiar with:
OK, I admit it—the title of this article may be a bit misleading. There really aren’t just six departments that need export training. Anyone and everyone who touches even the remotest part of the export process needs to understand how their job fits into the bigger picture of global trade and compliance.
The best way to align your entire organization around export responsibilities is to implement a written Export Compliance Program (ECP). An ECP provides clear procedures and accountability for every department involved in international transactions.
With an ECP in place, each team member can see:
But creating an ECP isn’t a one-and-done task. To be effective, your company must:
Most importantly, the president or CEO of the company must be committed to investing the resources required to create and maintain the ECP. Without regular and visual support by top executives of the process, your ECP will be just another written manual that gets filed away in the bottom desk drawer only to be pulled out when something goes wrong.
Like what you read? Subscribe today to the International Trade Blog to get the latest news and tips for exporters and importers delivered to your inbox.
This post was originally published in October 2016 and has been updated to include current information, links and formatting.