GLOBAL STRATEGY: Building a Culture of Leadership and Collaboration

At Strategic Sports, we are committed to building a global company culture that transcends language, national boundaries, experience, and even personalities. As we expand our operations beyond China to Portugal, Vietnam, and other regions, we are creating new internal processes to share expertise and encourage collaboration across our diverse team.

Growth, Potential, Challenge, and Opportunity

Strategic’s new global factory locations have added capability, capacity, and supply chain solutions for our partners and customers, but they have also brought their own challenges and inefficiencies, such as the need to hold multiple meetings in different languages. Regional differences in work routines have also required adaptation on all sides. “This is a challenge, but it is also a tremendous opportunity,” said Strategic Sports Managing Director Norman Cheng.

Merging Experience with Fresh Talent

Our factories in China, established in the early 1990s, have been critical to Strategic Sports’ success. Over the years, we’ve accumulated deep technical knowledge and helmet manufacturing expertise. While our newer Portuguese facility is brimming with fresh energy and state-of-the-art machinery, it lacks the same depth of experience.

Out of necessity, an innovative leadership solution emerged. “By bringing senior engineers from China to work closely with our Portuguese team, we can quickly combine decades of experience with new ideas to strengthen our overall capabilities,” Cheng said.

A Co-Leadership Approach

To ensure our teams are fully integrated, Strategic introduced a co-leadership model at many facilities. In Portugal, we paired Bruno Miguel Felix Vieira Pedro, an experienced leader and manager with a diverse industry background, and FuPeng, a 20-year veteran at Strategic, most recently in charge of our Basecamp factory at Chasan. Despite differences in language, culture, and background, this duo now jointly manages the Portuguese facility.

This model allows us to bridge cultural gaps, enhance communication, and make better, faster decisions by leveraging the strengths of both leaders. As co-leaders, they’re both invested in resolving differences and aligning to make the best collective decisions for the business.

“We’re creating partnerships,” Cheng said. “And like any true partnership, both co-leaders must take the time to hear and consider each other’s point of view and come up with solutions that work for both sides.”

Building a Global Future 

Strategic Sports’ ambition is for each of our factories, and our entire team, to be more than just Chinese, Portuguese, Vietnamese, or American. “We are creating a unified organization where knowledge, skills, and leadership are shared across borders, strengthening the entire company and bringing solutions to our customers, no matter what their needs might be,” Cheng said. 

“We’re just getting started. We’ve already seen signs of success in Portugal with Bruno Pedro and FuPeng and how they support each other and tackle decisions together,” Cheng said. “Building this global culture is an ongoing process, and it will take time and effort, but we believe it is essential for adapting to the complexities of today’s global market and for driving long-term success for Strategic Sports and our partners.”