Author Archives: Rusty Rueff

About Rusty Rueff

Rusty Rueff, author of purposed worKING. Rusty Rueff is the former Chairman Emeritus of The GRAMMY Foundation in Los Angeles. He most recently completed the successful 16 month leadership role as Coordinating National Co-Chair for Technology for Obama (T4O) for the reelection of President Obama and ten-years of Board service and President of the Board of Trustees of the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Corporately, most recently Rueff was the Chief Executive Officer at SNOCAP, Inc. until the acquisition of the company by imeem, Inc. in April 2008. Before joining SNOCAP in 2005, he was Executive Vice President of Human Resources at Electronic Arts (EA) from 1998 until 2005. He was also with the PepsiCo companies for more than ten years, with the Pratt & Whitney division of United Technologies for two years, and in commercial radio as an on-air personality for six years. Rusty holds an M.S. in counseling and a B.A. in radio and television from Purdue University. In 2003 he was named a distinguished Purdue alumnus, and he and his wife, Patti, are the named benefactors of Purdue’s Patti and Rusty Rueff School of Visual and Performing Arts. He is a corporate director of Glassdoor.com and runcoach. He is the co-founder and Executive Committee Member of T4A.org, serves on the Founding Circle of The Centrist Project and a founding Board Member of The GRAMMY Music Education Coalition. He is also the co-author of the book Talent Force: A New Manifesto for the Human Side of Business. Rusty and his wife, Patti, reside in Hillsborough, CA and Charlestown, R.I.

day 2251: Sun Showers

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“Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, surrounded by a cloud, with a rainbow over his head. His face shone like the sun…”

I read an interesting little article by Joanna Klein about “Sun Showers”.  She describes that when the sun is shining at the same it is raining as this being a “magical weather paradox”. She goes on to explain a Sun Shower as this: “Often you’ll spot them when the atmosphere around you is, in meteorological terms, unstable — which is more likely during the spring and summer in many parts of the world. In this condition, temperature variations encourage columns of air to move vertically, rising rapidly in some places and sinking in others. In the rising columns, the air cools, condensing moisture within it and allowing clouds and showers to develop. But the air in the sinking columns suppresses clouds, creating areas of clear skies between showers — and the possibility of sun showers.”

This got me thinking about how in business even when the sun is shining brightly with growth, expansion, positive developments, etc. that we can daily be beset with rain showers of disagreement, disgruntlement, anger, greed, resentment and jealousy, to name just a few.  These are all normal, but they seem way more obvious and pronounced when the sun is shining so brightly. And that is what being able to put things into context is all about.  There is never a perfect year, month, week or day.  Yes, a “sun shower” should always be expected.

Let’s look at how God has set up our lives. He gave us His Son to light our lives with love, grace, mercy and salvation. And then at the same time, we have been given free will and have a sinful nature, creating our own version of rain showers in the midst of God’s shining light in our lives.  So, yes, we are susceptible to our own “sun showers”.  So let’s do our best today to see something beautiful in all of this – wow, maybe we can even see a rainbow!

Reference: Revelation 10:1