In his new book entitled "The Future Arrived Yesterday", Michael S. Malone defines a new phenomenon in the corporate world which he calls the Protean Corporation. The Protean Corporation is a new form of organization that is structured to handle the stresses and strains we see emerging in our marketplace today. Stresses ranging from the retiring baby boomers being replaced by Gen Xer's, Gen Y's and millennials to the rising Asian workforce, continuous Internet connectivity, the pace of technological change, dramatic increases in new consumers the emerging nations and the rise in entrepreneurialism. These stresses and strains are unleashing an unprecedented rate of change into the marketplace, a rate of change that has never before been experienced and one that the organizations of today cannot possible handle successfully.

According to Malone the Protean Corporation "must find a way to continuously and rapidly change almost everyone of their attributes - products, services, finances, physical plant, markets, customers, and both tactical and strategic goals - yet at the same time retain a core of values, customs, legends, and philosophy that will be little affected by the continuous and explosive changes taking place just beyond its edges."

How does the Protean Corporation do this? By structuring itself into three distinct groups;

1. Core - the core staff are permanent staff responsible to retain the core values, customs, legends, and philosophies so that they will be little affected by the continuous and explosive changes. It is up to them to uphold the corporation's culture.

2. Inner Ring - permanent employees responsible for the operations of the business. These staff need to understand the workings of the business inside and out and must be extraordinary leaders as they will be leading day to day activities of the "Cloud" which makes up 90% of the Protean Corporation.

3. Cloud - In terms of numbers, the Cloud makes up 90% of the Protean Corporation. These are temporary staff whose employment may last anywhere from hours to days to years depending on their role and the requirements of the Protean Corporation at the time. They will be the staff that actually executes most of the day to day work under the guidance and direction of the Inner Ring. The Core employees will oversee the Inner Ring and the Cloud and ensure that the corporation's core culture is maintained.

What does this have to do with your Strength Zone?

Its pretty simple really….unless you understand your strengths and are working in your Strength Zone, you are not going to understand  where you fit into the Protean Corporation and you will end up getting steam rolled by it. You need to understand how you can best apply your strengths in this new organization and whether you are best fit to live in the Core, the Inner Ring or the Cloud.

No matter how the Protean Corporation structures itself to handle the increasing rate of change in today's world, unless its employees are working in their areas of strength (their Strength Zone), the Protean Corporation will not be successful.