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 3K20: Trigger Words

“The crowd listened until Paul said that word. Then they all began to shout, “Away with such a fellow! He isn’t fit to live!”

How is it that one word can make such a difference?  If there was ever a time in my lifetime that people trigger off of words that they are listening for as if it tells them all they need to know about another person, it is now.  Think about the words that might be the trigger for you?  In business, we also listen for certain words to understand a company’s culture, the leadership style of the CEO, the value placed on employees, etc.  It would be smart for each of us to have our own list of words that we are looking for as well as be cognizant of the words we use as someone else is certainly istening to us too.

Paul didn’t mince words and he likely knew the trigger words before he spoke them.  As believers, each day we are faced with moments where we get to choose between the words that we use, or that we don’t.  There are many trigger words that can cause someone to turn negative to us, or catch us up on our witness as a believer.  And just as so, there are trigger words that can lighten up a conversation, create calm and peace, even have someone ask us more about ourselves and what we believe.  Those trigger words do really matter.  Let’s choose wisely and obediently.

Reference:  Acts 22:22 (New Living Translation)