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 1065: Lighting Up

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“You are the light of the world…”

Here in the Bay Area we are about to be gifted an art project that could end up being one of the coolest art installations ever.  It’s called “The Bay Lights” project.  http://thebaylights.org/  In March the Bay Bridge will be lit up like never before.  The artist describes the project this way: “The Bay Lights is the world’s largest light sculpture, 1.8 miles wide and 500 feet high and inspired by the Bay Bridge 75th anniversary. Using 25,000 white individually programmed LED lights, artist Leo Villareal will create complex algorithms and patterns in a dazzling display across the bridge’s west span.”  They have already begun testing the lights and I will say, it is way cool and I can’t wait until it is fully operational.  I am always amazed at large scale projects and what it takes to tackle them and make them real.  It’s a lot of big thinking and a whole bunch more attention to small details. One without the other doesn’t achieve anything. It is only when the strategic and the tactical meet and support each other that we can make something really big happen successfully.  I will be watching for the Bay Lights project to come together this spring and then watch what the creativity will bring millions of people as a way of looking at the Bridge like never before.

As I read about and watched the practice of the bridge lighting, I was reminded by this project in how God works through each of us.  Think of each of us as one of His lights that can stay lit for a lifetime and when lit we emit His love and message.  When combined with with other lights we can be orchestrated to do something pretty amazing for Him. But even as just one light, we can play an important role in allowing someone to see something that they may never have seen or experienced prior.  Let’s consider that we are His light today in our workplaces.  How brightly are we burning for Him and how much are we allowing Him to control when we are to be turned on for Him – to bring His plans and design as a significant experience for others?

Reference: Mark 5:14 (New Living Translation)