Empowered Imperative, The: Assertively Managing Yourself for Optimum Success

"Success in anything requires self-confidence and an ability to handle difficulties and competing influence/interests. The Empowered Imperative provides a foundation to do exactly that."
—Fairfield County Business Times, January 2003

"This book should be required reading for anyone in a leadership position"
—Reggie Fowler, Former NFL player, now a successful entrepreneur.

"Finally someone said it the way it needs to be said. It's right on! It has practical intelligence and you can use it!"
—John Sellett, MD, Sports and Family Practice

"Smeed's compendious style of writing makes his well organized book extremely readable. It's rich and informative content makes the title comprehendible. And the reader will gain self-confidence and feel a motivating permission to excel."

—John Jarvis, MD, Psychiatry

Summary of Themes & Concepts

It is a back-to-basics primer on how to be successful in various aspects of your life.

ATTITUDE + PREPARATION + EXECUTION = OPTIMUM RESULTS

Notes:

The success of any organization is dependent on the success of individuals and their technical, philosophical, and ethical fit with the organization and it's goals. Leaders must be capable of demonstrating advanced levels of integrity, critical thinking/reasoning, and judgment and must not constrain themselves with often useless, misapplied and institutionalized generally accepted practices. If the leaders are indeed built and refined enough to take on that responsibility, they must still continuously improve/reengineer themselves and their organization. They must address issues effectively, assertively and quickly…themselves, without improper delegation. This book explores the leadership characteristics that are essential to the success of all organizations and individuals (including in their personal lives).

Conclusions revolve around the need to ensure integrity throughout the organization by culling out individuals with marginal ethics, abilities and/or agendas…especially those in pace-setting, visible, influential positions. Effective management and quality improvement (of anything) cannot exist without the direct involvement of managers/executives at the levels where the actual work is being done. Selection process for these "leaders" are often flawed; the contribution and effectiveness of many corporate resources and advisors is often over-rated and over-relied-upon.

The messages are timeless, and in constant need of reinforcement. What makes these essays stand out is their practicality, usefulness, understandability and common sense. Issues are addressed head-on vs. using arcane labels, obtuse references to irrelevant organizations, cutsey indirect messages ("Cheese"), esoteric/academic diatribes and unnecessary philosophizing. This book provides real answers instead of teasers and more questions…it is stuff normal people can actually use. It is what a father might tell his kids who are embarking on a career, and a reminder for those running a business.

NICHOLAS SMEED made a small fortune as an owner/executive of a rapidly growing, high-end, full service manufacturing company. Prior to that he held senior management positions in health care and government since he was 26 years old. He has also worked in several other industries: education, social work, utilities, transportation, and construction. He has been a teacher (middle school math to university graduate school instruction), a published writer, award-winning photographer, top ranked tennis player, professional entertainer, consultant, negotiator, postal worker, and wilderness camp counselor, among many other experiences. He has been an advocate for management as well as for unions and individuals.

The author is a personification of the empowered mindset: multi-skilled, constantly pursuing new adventures and self-improvement, always assertively seeking innovative and effective ways of solving problems, and grounded with many experiences and knowledge. He is multi-lingual and multi-cultural (Latvian-Russian heritage), and he emigrated to the U.S. from Germany, where he was born. An eager student of engineering, sciences and arts, sociology and industrial psychology, he attended the University of Colorado and Wayne State University.