Top 12 Import Export Coordinator Skills to Put on Your Resume

In today's knotty, border-blurring economy, Import Export Coordinators stitch together supply lines that cross oceans and time zones. The job demands nimble thinking, crisp execution, and a toolkit of skills that can weather shifting regulations, volatile freight markets, and prickly timelines. Showcasing the right strengths on your resume signals you can move cargo and conversations with equal ease.

Import Export Coordinator Skills

1. Multilingual
2. Negotiation
3. Compliance
4. SAP
5. Logistics
6. Incoterms
7. Customs
8. Documentation
9. Forecasting
10. MS Office
11. Supply Chain
12. CRM Software

1. Multilingual

Multilingual means you can handle conversations, negotiations, and written exchanges in more than one language, smoothing interactions with partners, carriers, and customs authorities around the globe.

Why It's Important

It cracks open markets, trims misunderstandings, and speeds decisions. Cultural nuance lands better. Deals inch forward faster. Problems get solved before they sprawl.

How to Improve Multilingual Skills

Build daily habits and work-specific fluency that actually sticks:

1. Target the right languages: Prioritize languages tied to your lanes and key suppliers or customers.

2. Learn business vocabulary: Focus on trade, logistics, payments, and compliance terms—not just small talk.

3. Practice with native speakers: Short, frequent conversations beat occasional marathons.

4. Use smart tools: Translation apps and grammar checkers help in a pinch, but verify for accuracy on critical documents.

5. Immerse lightly: Read industry news, watch short videos, and mirror phrasing used by pros in that market.

6. Role-play scenarios: Practice shipment delays, claims handling, price renegotiations—realistic, high-pressure moments.

How to Display Multilingual Skills on Your Resume

2. Negotiation

Negotiation is the art and structure of shaping terms—price, lead time, Incoterms, payment, liability—so both sides can move freight and keep relationships intact.

Why It's Important

Margins tighten or widen at the table. Reliable schedules are born there too. Sound negotiation cuts risk, anchors long-term partnerships, and keeps your pipeline humming.

How to Improve Negotiation Skills

Sharpen strategy, then practice relentlessly:

1. Prep beyond the basics: Know your BATNA, cost drivers, market rates, capacity constraints, and seasonal swings.

2. Listen for signals: Tone, pauses, and what’s left unsaid often reveal true priorities.

3. Frame clearly: State must-haves, nice-to-haves, and walk-away points without fog.

4. Trade, don’t concede: Package asks. If you give on price, tighten payment terms or service levels.

5. Mind culture: Decision cadence and hierarchy vary widely. Adjust pace and formality.

6. Close with precision: Confirm terms in writing—dates, responsibilities, documents, penalties.

How to Display Negotiation Skills on Your Resume

3. Compliance

Compliance means obeying trade laws, sanctions, export controls, product standards, and recordkeeping requirements in every jurisdiction you touch.

Why It's Important

It keeps cargo moving and reputations clean. Fines, seizures, and shipment holds are expensive—and avoidable with the right controls.

How to Improve Compliance Skills

Build a system that doesn’t rely on memory:

1. Track rule changes: Monitor official government portals and notices. Watch for updates like sanctions lists, tariff shifts, and safety rules.

2. Codify processes: Create a written compliance program with screening, classification, licensing, and record retention procedures.

3. Classify accurately: Get HS/HTS codes and ECCN right. Document rationale and keep rulings handy.

4. Audit routinely: Spot-check entries, documents, and broker performance. Fix gaps quickly.

5. Train the team: Short, role-based refreshers beat annual info dumps.

6. Use the right tech: Screening, restricted party checks, and license management tools reduce human error. Note: Amber Road is now part of E2open.

7. Ask experts: Tap customs brokers or trade counsel for tricky classifications, valuation, and origin rules.

How to Display Compliance Skills on Your Resume

4. SAP

SAP is the backbone system many firms use for orders, inventory, shipping, and trade. Modules like SAP GTS or S/4HANA for International Trade handle screening, embargo checks, customs docs, and preference management.

Why It's Important

It ties data together—purchase orders to shipments to invoices—so you can move accurately, fast, and with audit trails ready.

How to Improve SAP Skills

Go beyond navigation—own the flow:

1. Map end-to-end: Understand how sales orders trigger deliveries, customs docs, and billing. Follow the document flow.

2. Learn trade modules: Dive into GTS or S/4HANA International Trade features: screening, classification, embargo checks, and license determination.

3. Use a sandbox: Practice scenarios—returns, split shipments, diversions—without touching live data.

4. Automate where safe: Templates, partner profiles, and condition records shave time and errors.

5. Stay current: Track release notes for changes affecting customs, e-docs, and integration.

6. Partner with IT: Build quick reports and dashboards. Make exceptions pop, not hide.

How to Display SAP Skills on Your Resume

5. Logistics

Logistics is planning and steering the movement and storage of goods—mode, route, carrier, warehouse—so shipments arrive when and where they should, for the right cost.

Why It's Important

Done well, it cushions disruptions, trims detours, and anchors service reliability. Customers feel it instantly.

How to Improve Logistics Skills

Tune what you can measure and influence:

1. Pick the right mode and mix: Balance transit time, cost, and risk. Expedite only when it truly pays.

2. Tighten inventory: Apply just-in-time principles where feasible, but protect against supply shocks with smart safety stocks.

3. Standardize documents: Clean, consistent paperwork prevents holds and rework.

4. Track actively: Use shipment visibility tools; act on exceptions, not just dashboards.

5. Cultivate carriers: Long-term contracts, scorecards, and frank feedback stabilize capacity and pricing.

6. Run post-mortems: After major delays, dissect root causes. Fix upstream, not just at the dock.

7. Stay compliant: Build checks for embargoes, dangerous goods, and packaging rules directly into your process.

How to Display Logistics Skills on Your Resume

6. Incoterms

Incoterms are globally recognized rules that split delivery costs, risk, and responsibilities between seller and buyer. Incoterms 2020 remain the current version.

Why It's Important

They decide who pays for freight, who clears customs, where risk transfers, and who insures. Clarity here prevents painful surprises.

How to Improve Incoterms Skills

Turn definitions into operational clarity:

1. Master the 11 terms: Know how EXW differs from FCA, why CIF isn’t for air, and where risk flips for each term.

2. Choose terms intentionally: Align with your control over carriers, customs, and insurance—not habit.

3. Write it cleanly: Always include place/port, not just the three-letter term (e.g., FOB, Shanghai Port).

4. Train stakeholders: Sales, purchasing, and finance must understand the downstream impact.

5. Review annually: As lanes, partners, and risk appetites change, your default terms should too.

6. Escalate edge cases: Complex multimodal moves or DDP into new countries often need legal review.

How to Display Incoterms Skills on Your Resume

7. Customs

Customs authorities regulate cross-border goods, assess duties and taxes, enforce trade policy, and guard against illicit shipments.

Why It's Important

They decide whether your cargo sails through or sits. Understanding how they operate reduces delays and costs.

How to Improve Customs Skills

Precision plus preparation wins:

1. Classify and value correctly: Accurate HS codes, valuation methods, and origin proofs are non-negotiable.

2. Pre-clear when possible: Submit data early. Use advance cargo information programs to cut dwell time.

3. Align with brokers: Share SOPs, product databases, and escalation paths. Review entries and KPIs.

4. Maintain records: Keep documents and audit trails accessible for the required retention periods.

5. Monitor programs: Consider AEO/CTPAT-type programs for trusted trader benefits.

6. Run internal audits: Catch errors before customs does. Corrective actions should be documented.

How to Display Customs Skills on Your Resume

8. Documentation

Documentation covers everything from commercial invoices and packing lists to certificates, licenses, and transport documents. Clean inputs, lawful outputs.

Why It's Important

Wrong or incomplete paperwork triggers holds, penalties, and do-overs. Accurate docs keep the chain of custody—and cash flow—intact.

How to Improve Documentation Skills

Make consistency your default:

1. Standardize templates: Pre-approved formats for key documents reduce typos and misses.

2. Control master data: Product descriptions, HS codes, weights, and origins must be governed and up to date.

3. Use checklists: Shipment type, destination, and Incoterms drive which docs you need.

4. Version control: Keep a single source of truth. Timestamp changes and approvals.

5. Write plainly: Avoid ambiguity. Customs officers and carriers read fast; help them.

6. Review before release: A second set of eyes catches costly errors.

How to Display Documentation Skills on Your Resume

9. Forecasting

Forecasting anticipates demand, supply constraints, freight capacity, and lead times so inventory and logistics stay in sync.

Why It's Important

It trims stockouts and bloated buffers, sharpens buying, and aligns booking windows with reality.

How to Improve Forecasting Skills

Blend math with market sense:

1. Exploit history: Segment by product and region; pick models that match patterns (seasonal, sporadic, fast movers).

2. Add real-world signals: Promotions, policy changes, port congestion, and holidays all bend the curve.

3. Collaborate: Get supplier commits, carrier capacity views, and sales intel into one conversation.

4. Measure bias and error: Track MAPE or forecast bias and correct systematically.

5. Scenario plan: Build best/base/worst cases and tie them to specific logistics plans.

6. Refresh frequently: Rolling horizons beat stale quarterly guesses.

How to Display Forecasting Skills on Your Resume

10. MS Office

MS Office is your everyday toolkit: Excel for analysis, Word for formal docs, PowerPoint for stakeholder updates, Outlook for coordination.

Why It's Important

It’s the language of internal alignment. Clean spreadsheets and crisp documents move decisions forward.

How to Improve MS Office Skills

Focus on speed, accuracy, and presentation:

1. Excel: Learn PivotTables, XLOOKUP, INDEX/MATCH, conditional formatting, and basic macros for repetitive tasks.

2. Word: Use styles, templates, and content controls to keep contracts and certificates consistent.

3. PowerPoint: Tell the story—trend, risk, action. Favor charts over text blocks.

4. Outlook: Rules, shared calendars, and quick steps keep threads and appointments under control.

5. Shortcuts and templates: Small time savers add up over hundreds of shipments.

How to Display MS Office Skills on Your Resume

11. Supply Chain

The supply chain is the web of suppliers, plants, warehouses, carriers, and customers that moves a product from origin to end user. Your job: keep the threads tight and flowing.

Why It's Important

Resilient supply chains beat volatility. They deliver on time, control cost, and recover faster when things break.

How to Improve Supply Chain Skills

Strengthen visibility and relationships while trimming waste:

1. Standardize processes: Clear SOPs for planning, ordering, shipping, and escalation cut chaos.

2. Boost visibility: Track orders, inventory, and shipments end-to-end. Make exceptions loud.

3. Use data: Measure lead times, OTIF, dwell, and cost-to-serve. Improve what you can see.

4. Diversify risk: Secondary suppliers, alternate ports, and flexible modes blunt disruptions.

5. Collaborate tightly: Share forecasts and constraints with suppliers and carriers. Reciprocity builds trust.

6. Invest in learning: Certifications and workshops from organizations like ASCM keep skills sharp and current.

7. Stay compliant by design: Bake regulatory checks into planning, not just shipping.

How to Display Supply Chain Skills on Your Resume

12. CRM Software

CRM software stores interactions, quotes, claims, and contacts in one place, revealing patterns and promises that keep customers loyal and informed.

Why It's Important

It centers the customer. You see commitments, open issues, and next steps—no hunting through inboxes.

How to Improve CRM Software Skills

Make the system work the way you do:

1. Clean the data: Standardize account names, contacts, and identifiers. Duplicates kill trust.

2. Tailor fields and workflows: Add fields for Incoterms, lanes, compliance flags, and claim status. Automate handoffs.

3. Integrate: Connect CRM with ERP, TMS, and ticketing. Fewer silos, fewer surprises.

4. Build dashboards: Surface quotes pending, on-time performance, and open disputes at a glance.

5. Log consistently: If it’s not recorded, it didn’t happen. Make updates part of the rhythm.

6. Secure access: Role-based permissions and audit trails protect sensitive data and meet policy requirements.

How to Display CRM Software Skills on Your Resume