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 848: Bossin’ Around

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“For we are not our own masters when we live or die.”

In October there is a day called “Boss’s Day”. Really? Yes, but you won’t see Hallmark making a big deal out of sending “Boss’s Day” cards. Most of us appreciate our boss, to a point, but that is to a certain point and then it stops there. Why is this? Well, first of all we can respect our boss’s and stand behind them without reservation but there is something that never can get past the point that they are our boss. Rarely can we be best friends with our boss. I remember the story I once heard of a learning from a boss. this executive/boss was sitting at the dinner table with his family and he was speaking poorly of his boss in front of his family and badmouthing the boss in so many ways that finally one of his sons said, “You know Dad, it sure is a good thing that the people who work for you aren’t at home talking about you like you are talking about your boss.” What an eye-opener for this executive. Yes, it happens to all of us. If we are in a leadership position it comes with the territory that we are going to get the good and the bad with the job. Let’s just remember that no matter how much we think we are being a great boss, that someone, or many, at one point or another, will think of us in the stereotypical perception of “the boss”. The best we can do is to “boss up” and do our best to manage and lead through pure values, principles, integrity and consistency. Let’s all try to “boss up” in the right way today.

Paul tells us in Romans that we can’t expect to be the boss of ourselves if we are also believers. It’s a fact, there can only be one boss at a time in our work and in our lives. The idea that we can serve multiple masters just isn’t so. We might vacillate but we choose what and who we are going to follow at any given time and that becomes our boss. We need to think hard about who we are letting be the boss of our lives. What we say and what we do may not be the same. Let’s consider what/who is bossin’ us around today?

Reference: Romans 14:7 (New Living Testament)