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 825: Understanding

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“But do people know where to find wisdom? Where can they find understanding? No one knows where to find it, for it is not found among the living.”

“I just don’t understand”, says the new employee. The boss of the employee pauses for a moment and knows that she needs to slow down and take a few more minutes to clarify and reinforce the point, but she is busy, late for a meeting with her boss, and she just can’t “afford” the time. So, instead of fixing a time to talk later or direct the employee to someone else, she says instead, “Don’t worry about it. You and I can catch up on this later.” And then she whisks off and the new employee who is excited and anxious at the same time about his new job, goes on about his job, doing what he can without really understanding what it is that he specifically is to do. If this scenario doesn’t feel familiar then I would be surprised. Understanding is hard to get to and we take it for granted that others will understand and since it is so hard to get to an “understanding” we seldom go the whole way to nail it down once and for all. Understanding can be a competitive advantage if we just take the time to make sure that everyone truly does understand what to do, when to do it, and how to do it to a level of shared satisfaction.

We are told in Job that we can’t find understanding and wisdom from the living. While this, on the surface, seems to not be so, when we consider a deep and true understanding and wisdom of our lives, we can see why this statement is true. This is why God gave us His Word. Written long before us by ones long gone, we can find the wisdom of God there. Each day, each of us, face a set of work and life challenges that we know if we had more understanding and wisdom that we would be able face these big and small things in a way that would allow us to conquer whatever is given to us. Before we take on today, let’s take just a few minutes to ready and arm ourselves with His Word to move us through today.

Reference: Job 28:12-13 (New Living Testament)