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 3K258: The Watchouts – Weasels

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“No accounting of this money was required from the construction supervisors, because they were honest and trustworthy men.”

Most people we come across in the workplace who act out for themselves and/or try to undermine and undercut people are just the people whom for whatever reasons like fear, insecurity or something that has been pressed upon them by others, do sneaky and slimy things without really knowing they are doing them. Sure, somewhere deep inside they know it is wrong, but they have covered up the difference between these little rights and wrongs for so long ago that today they don’t even know what they are doing that hurts others.  For these people, we learn their ways and maybe we shouldn’t, but we take them as they are and just learn to work with and around them.  But, there are those who are deliberate in their actions and these (as Jim VandeHei call them) are The Weasels.  Weasels are not a good animal example to be compared. They are sneaky, they are conniving, they are cunning and they are dangerous.  When we spot a Weasel in our business, we have to bring attention to them so that someone higher up than them can decide what to do.  The times I have encountered Weasels, and I have, I’ve done my part to exit them from the company.  It’s not right for anyone other than the Weasel for them to be able to do their dirty business.

No one can trust a Weasel.  Which, is why we never can be one of them if we think that someone else would trust our beliefs.  We must be trustworthy to truly bring glory to God through our work.  We want to be as trustworthy as the Temple construction workmen where King Joash and his staff were able to put so much trust in them that they didn’t need any oversight or even accounting.  That’s the opposite of being a Weasel and that is who we want to be, or at least strive to be in the eyes of God and others.

Reference: 2 Kings 12:15 (New Living Translation)