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 3K144: Come With Me

purposed worKING No Comments

“Passing along, Jesus saw a man at his work collecting taxes. His name was Matthew. Jesus said, “Come along with me.” Matthew stood up and followed him.”

When you say the sentence, “Come with me” in your head, what voice do you hear?  Do you hear a tone of excitement like a kid so excited to show us something?  Or do we hear the voice a school Principal calling us out of class and saying, “Come with me”?  I’d like to think it would be the former, but I fear it might be the latter as we are more used to the voices of authority speaking to us as if we are in trouble.  It’s worth thinking about in the tone of our leadership statements.  Imagine if the boss walked into a meeting and singled out a person and said, “Come with me”.  The conversation after the person leaves the room likelywouldn’t steer towards, “Wow, she must be getting promoted!”  Yes, our tone matters.

When Jesus called His Disciples to come with Him, the intonation in His voice had to be like no other.  He spoke with authority but He also spoke with love and care.  And there must have also been something unique in His voice that was exciting and compelling.  We can never find or strike that same tone, but we can try.  We can also listen daily for when He asks us to come with me and the more we listen and respond, the closer we will indeed come to Him.

Reference: Matthew 9:9 (The Message)

In the U.S., have a great Memorial Day weekend.  PwK will be back next Tuesday.