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 1544: All Wrapped Up

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“There is still one thing you haven’t done. Sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

Having just celebrated Christmas, the image of all of that used wrapping paper being shoved into big plastic bags is still fresh.  Every year I think about the amount of paper, money and time that goes into the wrapping of the gifts and then in an instant it all gets torn and shredded and thrown away.  And every year, it jars me to remember that much of what we “wrap” ourselves up with in our business is just as unimportant as wrapping paper.  We spend a bunch of effort, money and people’s time getting the wrapping right, only to have it figuratively and literally thrown away after the presentation, meeting, project ending, etc.  I’m not saying that some, or many times, we don’t have to ensure that the wrapping makes the right first impression, but let’s not forget that when opened, it is what is inside that is remembered, and the wrappings; well can you remember the patterns or the paper of the wrapping on your last set of gifts?

When Jesus told the rich, young ruler that all he needed to now do was to sell everything and give it to the poor, He wasn’t telling us that we can’t strive and work hard to be successful, etc. but He was telling us to not get wrapped up in the things that become more important than obeying what He wants us to do to fully follow Him.  The rich, young ruler had wrapped himself in all the things that he personally couldn’t give up and so they became a barrier to following Jesus.  In this account, Jesus challenges us all to ask ourselves whether or not we are paying too much attention to the wrapping and missing the gift!

Reference:  Luke 18: 22 (New Living Translation)