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 194: Needed Praise and Recognition

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It has become abundantly clear to me that we all need recognition and praise from others. It seems so trite and silly at times and it seems so self-serving that it seems wrong to admit that we do need some praise and recognition to keep going. But, it is true and somewhere in the human experience it is built into us. At work there are systems that are established in the management process to try and bring that recognition and praise to people. Most of the time the systems that are built come across contrived or become over time rote and impersonal. The systems and processes are okay, but nothing replaces a good old-fashioned “thank you and well done” that is delivered in front of someones peers. The more spontaneous and tied to an event this can be done, the better. That type of recognition and praise goes a long, long way. In dealing with a personnel issue recently, I was reflecting on whether or not it was right or wrong that a very senior person in the organization seemed so needy for recognition and praise. I found myself saying to others, “this person is too experienced and in too big of a job to still be needing this level of recognition”. I still think there are degrees of anything that make the difference between what is acceptable and not, but at the root of it, my sentiment that this person shouldn’t still be looking for praise and recognition is probably wrong. We all need it and if it is not given, then the absence of recognition can be harmful for someone. I was reading a book this week by the author, Byron Ricks. The book is called, “Searching for Dad”. He talks about the need for sons to receive praise and recognition from their fathers. He says this; “Even Jesus longed for his Father’s praise. The Bible says, ‘After being baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and lighting on Him, and behold, a voice out of heavens said, ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased.'” If God can give praise to Jesus then we can give praise and recognition to others. We can start today by looking around the office and trying to find the person who doesn’t receive the recognition they should and then go give them some. Write a hand-written note to that person. Send a letter or email to their boss or their bosses’ boss telling them how great this person is and asking for them to receive the recognition due. Or, just take a group of people on your team with you and walk over to this person’s cubicle, workstation or office, and ask for a minute to just say thank you as a group. Whatever it takes to deliver recognition and praise today. You will be glad you did.

Reference: Luke 3:21-22 (New Living Testament)