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 1056: Saying It Over and Over Again

…”If it were not so, I would have told you.”

How much time do we spend in business restating, reassuring, and reemphasizing to others?  If you didn’t answer either “alot” or “too much” then I would be surprised.  A tremendous amount of time and energy is expended on being sure that everyone is on the same page and everyone is up to date.  Something weird happens in the work world that when someone says something that we start from the place of not believing or needing to be reassured almost immediately after a statement is made.  Just think of  the line outside of the office after a meeting with team members wanting clarifications or asking questions about themselves. Even though what was just said was all that there was to say.  If our personal lives were like the work world we’d all walk around asking questions over and over and never believing each other. It’s not a great way to operate but it is what it is at the office and that is why we have to say what we are going to say, say it, and then say what we said…and do that over and over and never assume anyone has comprehended or “gets it”. As frustrating as it is, we are better to embrace and accept it than ignore this way it is.

God is the only One who we can truly count on to say it once and know that we can trust Him to never waiver or go back on His Words.  When Jesus told the Disciples that “If it were not so, I would have told you”, He was saying that you can trust and believe all that He sasy and that there isn’t any hidden agenda or fears necessary that just because He never says it again, or we never physically hear Him speak, that still what He said remains true.  As we try to be more and more like Him we can model this with others in our jobs and lives.  How great it would be that others would see Him in us in that they can always count that what we say will always remain true.

Reference: John 14:2 (New Kings James Version)