Identifying and Ranking of Barriers for Activity of Export Management Companies (Case study: Khorasan Razavi Province)

Economic and industrial progress, coupled with heightened global competition, has turned market access and retention into intricate challenges. Within this context, a notable portion of businesses and trade practitioners, facing issues due to their specialization and high costs, encounter various hurdles when entering and sustaining positions in global markets. The utilization of export intermediaries, particularly export management companies, stands as a successful global experience and a potential tool for addressing a significant portion of export-related problems. The present study, of a descriptive-survey nature, employs a mixed (quantitative-qualitative) approach with the goal of identifying and ranking barriers faced by export management companies. To achieve this, a purposefully selected sample of experts in the export domain underwent specialized interviews, and after theoretical saturation, barriers were categorized into six titles and two overarching groups: intra-organizational and extra-organizational. The data were then ranked using a questionnaire and, finally, through the Friedman test. The ranking results reveal that skill and management barriers resulting from intra-organizational factors hold the highest importance, securing the first and second positions. Following these, three other barriers from the extra-organizational factors, centered around governance and policy-making, common factors, and those originating from the exporting community, respectively, rank third to fifth. Lastly, barriers with performance origins from the intra-organizational factors secure the sixth position.