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 2547: Wake Up Call

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“Before daybreak the next morning, Jesus got up and went out to an isolated place to pray.”

It’s kind of hard to believe that it wasn’t until 1787 that Levi Hutchins invented the alarm clock.  He was from America and was an inventor who said he didn’t have a schedule to wake up for, instead he just said he didn’t like sleeping too late in the day and he needed something to rouse him out of bed.  Before 1787, those who needed to rise at a certain hour would hire people to come knock on their doors to wake them, always begging the question, who woke the “wakers” up? There’s no evidence that waking early makes someone more productive than another person, but what there is evidence is that those who wake and carry out a routine daily, do find greater productivity and efficiency throughout the rest of their day.  It makes sense to me as I am both an early riser and a person of routine and when either of those get messed up, I feel out of whack all day long. But, it’s the wake up routine that matters, not the time. There is power in our disciplines and we should not overlook or waste that power.

We know Jesus woke early and would spend time in prayer before the day started.  Why did He wake early?  Who knows, but what we do know is that He sought isolation to pray, which would have meant a place of silence and without interruption. Before others woke, would have afforded him that space.  I too know of no such place in my house other than earlier in the morning than when Patti and the dog (Theo) rise.  Once they are up, there is no isolation, none what so ever.  Bottom line, whatever your day looks like, early or later, part of waking up in the right way is quiet time with God.  It is then, we are truly ready to start our day.

Reference: Mark 1:35 (New Living Translation)