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 40: Running In The Halls – part 2: Straight Ahead

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“It’s a rat race around here”. Ever heard that statement? What picture does it conjure up? When I hear that statement I think of a maze with two rats being let loose into the entrance and off they go working their way from one side of the other to get the cheese. Or, I see two rats running after each other, running in circles and swerves trying to catch each other. Minus the rats part, (or not minus, depending on where you work), the picture of running around like crazy or running around a maze can feel just like the office. We so many times feel like we are chasing and going from thing to thing without purpose or definition that we end up feeling like we have wasted time and energy until it just wears us down. We then wonder why we are not springing out of bed in the morning to get to work. As mentioned yesterday, Paul gives us his tips to winning the race for life and not only does he tell us to run the race to win, he also says to run with discipline and focus. In verse 26 of I Corinthians 9 he says, “So I run straight to the goal with purpose in every step. I am not like a boxer who misses his punches”. What Paul was modeling for us was efficiency and productivity in reaching a goal and purpose, because we can straighten out the line between two points. When we feel like we are in the rat race at work, a place to start to fix is determining where it is that you are trying go and get very specific on that goal and purpose and “straighten out” the corners and angles that get in your way. And when at work we meander and wander and lose that purpose of why we are here in the first place, we can end up in a maze that takes us quite a bit of time to exit at the goal. The straightening out of work can happen when we part ways with those that drag us down or cause issues for the sake of causing issues, or it might be adjusting our own emotions to filter out the negative attitudes within ourselves that so often can creep in. And, it might be that we need to start afresh today with getting down to business and not spending that extra time worrying or talking about what it is that things should be, but are out of our control. There is a great feeling about finishing a race strong. The same can happen today at work for you by setting your goals and purpose for the day and running straight towards that goal keeping the distractions away until the goal is achieved. A day where on he way home you can feel great about what was achieved is a GREAT day!

Reference: I Corinthians 9:26