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 2645: Blaming Cultures

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“Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.”

When someone makes a mistake in our organization how do we respond?  Is it a learning opportunity and one that the person who made the mistake walks away from whole and still with strong self-esteem and confidence?  Or, do we make an example of a mistake and “rub it in”?  Sadly, whether we know it or not, organizations that are without leaders who fight hard against the latter, a blaming culture will emerge.  “No, it won’t”, you say because the belief is that our values, principles and people we hire are not those who will point the finger at someone else. That would be so good, if only true.  We are creatures of the organizations we are in and our organizations are hierarchies that one gets ahead by promotion and advancement.  So, there is competition and competition creates winners and losers. Blaming those who have made mistakes is an easy way to mark those who are winning and those who are losing.  Yes, we must fight against the culture that regresses back to blaming.

How hard was it for Jesus to hang on the cross in excruciating pain at the precipice of the end of His human life and pray to the Father that He would forgive those who had done this to Him? If there is a moment that should remind us that Jesus was truly God, it is that moment. There are examples of humans who will die as martyrs for a cause, but to die to forgive, that’s only a God thing.  There is no blaming in the Kingdom of God and if it is not there, then it can’t be here with us. Can we be the crusaders of forgiveness and the antidote to blaming?

Reference: Luke 23:34 (New Living Translation)