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 2595: Economic Guarantees

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“So Jesus gave them permission. The evil spirits came out of the man and entered the pigs, and the entire herd of about 2,000 pigs plunged down the steep hillside into the lake and drowned in the water.”

By now, we should know that there are no economic guarantees.  What goes up, will come down. Tesla announced last week that they will close most of their retail showrooms and we are just going to have to buy their cars online.  What we don’t know is whether or not this is a survival move by Tesla or a disruption move that could be on the leading edge of change.  Consider the cost savings of real estate, labor and inventory of cars and the impact upon their margins.  If it doesn’t affect their sales, then it is a competitive advantage move against all the other car manufacturers who have to fill up those huge car lots with cars that they don’t know when they will sell and for how much?  We may be seeing a radical shift coming. And, to be sure, there are no economic guarantees.

Last month our church invited Jon Talbert to speak.  He referenced a verse in a way I had not thought of before. He pointed out that when Jesus allowed the evil spirits into the nearby two thousand pigs and then they plunged to their death into the lake, that the economic engine of the town may have been destroyed right there and then. What does this tell me?  It tells me that it is imperative that we do our best to keep God front and center in how we lead and work. God wants to be in the middle of all that we do and we need to keep Him there because it is us, as His children, not our companies or their economic successes, that matter to Him.

Reference: Mark 5:13 (New Living Translation)