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 3K49: The Liars Dividend

purposed worKING No Comments
“Then keep your tongue from speaking evil and your lips from telling lies!”

It’s hard to believe that anyone would think that there is a dividend to be earned and paid from telling a lie, but there are plenty of people who recognize that what is heard first and heard most pays a dividend, even when that is an untruth.  It’s a game that people play, and today more than ever when there isn’t any accountability when someone places an untruth into social media, or even into mainstream media.  And then, it can happen in our workplaces and when it is too hard, or takes too much time or effort to dispel the untruth, it can get cemented in and accepted and we just move on.  A few times of this, without repercussions, and it can become the norm.  Needless to say, this is not good.

The Psalmist makes it clear for us what is wrong for us to do.  And, we can add to this verse, “Then keep your tongue from speaking evil and your lips and fingers from telling lies!”  I was reminded the other day that no one who commits a large transgression (or even a crime) is doing so for the first time.  It’s important for us to remember that our little lies are also conditioning us to tell larger ones.  So, let’s not let the little ones creep in and become a part of how we conduct ourselves.  There is no dividend that God pays for our lie.

Reference:  Psalm 34:13 (New Living Translation)

Bonus:  This was a comment left yesterday by James C in response to post 3K48 – The Communication Gap:

“This is even harder in our current digitized world. You miss the glance of affirmation or the look of confusion. And instead, far too often, you just get nothing. So speakers or leaders end up becoming more like radio DJs than actually leaders, and the mechanisms for feedback take longer. In that case, I think the burden has to shift to the listener or reader to provide that nudge or word of encouragement. Because otherwise we end up with the weirdness that we see on social media in which only the loudest idea gets reactions.”

Great comment James. Thank you!