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 239: Ground Zero

purposed worKING No Comments

Eight years ago today on this day, I know exactly where I was. At 8:15AM I boarded a United flight at JFK to fly home to San Francisco. A little over an hour later I was in Indianapolis trying to make sense of the news that the pilot was giving us while we sat on the tarmac. Something about planes having crashed into the World Trade Center. When I reached my wife on the phone, she was hysterical as the prior 45 minutes she did not know if the plane I was on was one of the planes that had been hijacked or not. Needless to say, it was an emotional moment for us. Throughout that fateful week as I stayed with a college friend and his family in Indianapolis, who took me in like the stranded traveler that I was, we learned much about what had happened on Tuesday 9/11. I also learned that the flight that I had checked the night before with my assistant, and had talked about changing to to fly home, flight #93 out of Newark completed its journey in the fields of Pennsylvania. As we say sometimes way too glibly, “there but by the grace of God…”. It was on this day that we began to use the phrase “Ground Zero”. It now means only one thing to an American. On 9/11/2001 too many people never came home from a normal day at work in the World Trade Center Towers. It was also on that day that many people, because of the loss that they felt around them; loss of the lives of people they knew or didn’t but who they identified with, or loss of stability and security, looked to God for a foundation where they could find firm footing. It is in the time of loss, insecurity and desperation that many times we turn back to the only one who can give us the firm foundation that we need. As we read in Luke 6:48, we need to build our lives on a foundation of rock. “It is like the person building a house who digs deep and lays the foundation on solid rock”. In times of trouble, in times of loss, in times of unforeseen calamity, it is Jesus who is our foundation. It is Jesus who we must return to as the true “ground zero” in our lives.

May today we remember those who were just going to work on Tuesday September 11th, 2001 and didn’t come home. May we pray right now for their families and loved ones who still feel that loss and that they may they find the true ground zero in their lives.

Reference: Luke 6:48