Businesses attempting to navigate the shifting shoals of international tariffs, sanctions, and export controls are increasingly turning to trade-compliance professionals for guidance, according to a Dow Jones Risk Journal report.

Trade-compliance professionals oversee a range of requirements tied to U.S. and international trade laws, including correct product classification under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule, verification of import values, and tracking new restrictions that can change quickly, the report said. 

Once an “afterthought in the C-suite,” such professionals are now in increasingly high demand, the Risk Journal said. Recruiting site Indeed reported that postings for trade-compliance officers were 22 percent higher in December 2025 than a year earlier, and 41 percent above December 2019 levels.

The shift can be attributed in part to President Donald Trump’s “on-again, off-again” approach to tariffs, which has forced companies to contend with a host of complex and frequently changing rules, the news outlet said. 

“Companies are starting to recognize and really realize that this isn’t just something that is a nice-to-have—this is a must-have,” Colleen Erickson, a longtime trade-compliance executive who recently acquired Trade Compliance Recruiting Solutions, told the Risk Journal.

That trend is unlikely to change anytime soon, experts said in the report. 

“This is not going to end with an administration or another,” Arrow Electronic’s chief logistics officer, David Collier, told the Risk Journal. “I think this evolving trade policy is here to stay.”

Read more at Dow Jones Risk Journal