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 663: Time To Make The Move

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“The the Lord told Abram, ‘Leave your country, your relatives, and your father’s house, and go to the land that I will show you.”

As the economy recovers and companies start hiring there will return the need for people to begin relocating for new jobs. I am beginning to see it happening and it is always one of the most stressful actions on a person, a relationship or a family. But, it is a reality for anyone who works for a global company and wants to move up. Somewhere along the way the request is going to come and the decision must be made to go or stay. I am helping a number of organizations who are looking for people who will have to relocate for the new job. It is not an easy sell to get someone to uproot. This is why if we lead organizations where we will ask people to relocate for a position then we need to be ready to listen with great empathy and then solve for the difficulties. Solutions are one size fitting one and any organization that tries to cookie cutter their approach in this day and age will find that they will struggle more to get the best talent than they should have to do so. Finding the balance for what is good for the company and the employee is the answer. Win-wins when relocating people can go a long way in building good-will and loyalty with the employee and the family unit.

Imagine being Abraham (Abram at the time) and God telling him to uproot and leave all behind and just go. What courage and faith that must have taken. I think we tend to think that it was easier to follow and obey God back then because God would speak directly and burn bushes and things. But, let’s be real. If we were any more obeying then there wouldn’t have been cities and people wiped out by fire and floods. Just as it is now, it was then; some followed and listened to God and many others didn’t. Abraham made the move when he was requested to do so. We may not be being asked to physically move and leave all behind, but God is asking us to move today. He is asking us to move closer to Him and to leave behind the stuff that is in the way. Are we up to making the move He is asking for us to make?

Reference: Genesis 12:1 (New Living Testament)