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 735: Unlocking Potential

purposed worKING No Comments

“You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and committing yourself firmly to him. This is the key to your life…”

In the start-up world investors hope that their capital will unlock potential from a company and their founders that they may not be able to see or know just yet. At the early stages of a company it is seldom that the business will stay the same as first envisioned. Some call it “pivoting”, others just call it continuing to seek, try and then stop the things that aren’t working so new things can be tried. It’s hard to let go of work that has many hours and dollars already invested. So, it’s like having a locked door in front of us with a huge ring of keys that we continue to use and try until the door unlocks. What we know about business is that once that door unlocks that just behind it will be another door and the key that opened up the first door is not guaranteed to open the next one, or any other door. But, we have to continue to try and keep unlocking the doors in front of us. Companies that don’t, or aren’t willing to try and keep the doors opening in front of them will miss opportunities. It’s important that we find a way to keep working to unlock the potential.

We read in Deuteronomy how to unlock the potential in our life and the key to doing so. Like a business, we make choices and to receive this key to life we have to make the choice to love God, then obey Him, and then ensuring that we have deeply committed ourselves to Him and the life that He asks us to live. We should continuously be asking ourselves if our choices are the right ones and are we committed daily to following and bringing glory to God in all that we do. All day long we use our keys (literally and figuratively) to open the doors that are put in front of us. God wants us to pick up, accept and adopt the keys to life that God has given us. Today, what keys are we using to open the doors in front of us? Are they our own, or are they God’s. He is asking us to unlock all the potential that He has given us. Let’s be sure that we are choosing His keys today.

Reference: Deuteronomy 30:20 (New Living Testament)