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 2826: Managing Accounts

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“…I don’t want anyone to think more highly of me than what they can actually see in my life and my message.”

People work really hard to look good in the moment.  Maybe it is social media which has turned everything into a “photo op” and if we get the right one, then we think that bolsters or establishes who we are.  I know it’s been hard for those on Social Media who were so used to their regular photo ops that told the story of what they were doing and where they fit in with their social circles.  But, we all know (even when we don’t say it aloud) that we are perceived and yes, judged far deeper than just the surface of our lives and no picture that we create can change that.  In our work, it’s a culmination of our time, energy, actions and words that create the whole story of who we are.  It’s like we make deposits and withdrawals with every move we make, hoping to never bankrupt what others think of us.  The superficial, self-made up, trivial deposits don’t mean much. The deeper, time, energy, caring that spend on others are the deposits that yield.

Paul was a straight shooter.  He didn’t mince words, although it might have been more forceful in letters than in person (we are going to explore that tomorrow and how that works out for us these days), but he called it like it was and he didn’t care about how others judged him, nor did he try and manipulate or create perception from others. When you sum it up, it made sense that Paul was admired and followed by so many others, because at the end of the day he was who he was, what we would call now, “transparent” and wanted nothing more than to be the follower of Jesus that he aspired to be.  Isn’t that kind of accounting we would like to have of our lives?

Reference: 2 Corinthians 12:6 (New Living Translation)