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 530: Condemning

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I was sitting in a meeting the other day and I listened to one person condemn another (of course the person being condemned was not in the room) and without hesitation another person jumped on the the bandwagon to be shortly followed by another person. It was a bit of a bloodbath. With one small push back that maybe this wasn’t a fully fair assessment that was taking place, everyone backed down and adjusted their stance. This interaction reminded me of how easy it is to tear someone down and how hard it is to get people to instead build others up. We are quick to condemn and we are fast to pass the blame and tag others for maybe what we should be stepping up and owning ourselves. I’ve found that those who fluidly condemn others are not the same people who take accountability and accept their lumps when they should. These are also the same people who others either fear or even avoid because they worry that whatever is being said about others is also said about them when they leave the room. Paul knew how easy it is for people to be condemning when he point blank denounced it in Romans when he was talking to those who he was working with; “So let’s stop condemning each other. Decide instead to live in such a way that you will not cause another believer to stumble and fall.” That Paul had to say such a thing to the believers he was working with, only reinforces how he knew that we easily condemn and do so without the regard we should have for others. Today, think about how much condemning is going on around your office and reflect on what part you might be playing or what you can do to bring the condemnation down.

Reference: Romans 14:13 (New Living Testament)