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 540: Moving To Bigger

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As we work through our careers we think about moving up and sometimes moving to bigger companies to establish ourselves and (maybe) to prove that we can work and succeed on a bigger stage. Many people are most comfortable in smaller sized companies but there is certainly an entire group of people who move from one company to another with the hopes and dreams of getting into leadership positions at the largest of the large companies in the world. I’ve had friends who once they broke into these Fortune 50 senior executive positions would never consider moving down the ladder into a smaller organization. For them, there is challenge and prestige in large scale. For others, that is far less important. But to all the idea of moving to something bigger as it relates to challenge and growth is a common quest. What we have to define for ourselves is what is the correct definition of larger and more expansive. It could be the expanded role we are offered within our own company or it could be the same position in a larger company. It could be expanding and growing what we do now organically and sticking with it as it grows. It is hard to always discern and sometimes we only know by trial and error. We take the risk, we jump into something bigger and if it doesn’t work out then we try and find our way back to a similar role that we had before. This can work or we can learn as much about the bigger job from others as we can and then take our own self-assessment as to whether or not this will be good for us, before we jump. Either way we find out somehow where we best fit in the size of company and role thing. This is another place where we shouldn’t keep God out of our work. We should allow Him to lead us as we consider the growth of our career and where we should be. King David talked about the larger places and the responsibilities he was given in Psalm 18:19; “He brought me forth also into a large place; he delivered me, because he delighted in me.” When we wonder and plan about moving to something bigger, we should not forget that He knows what fits for each of us and if we allow Him to lead and ourselves to follow, we will discover our perfect size opportunities.

Reference: Psalm 18:19 (New Living Testament)