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 3K282: What’s Next?

purposed worKING No Comments

“In His grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well…”

I get asked to do a fair amount of career “counseling”.  It’s not really counseling as much as it is advice and passing along my own experience.  I am faced with the quandary of others as they are questioning what  they should do next.  It’s not always big career-changing question, it is also inside of existing businesses where people are curious, doubting, or confused about what their next job should be.  Surprisingly, there are many who even wonder what their next assignment within their current job should be.  I have found that much of this boils down to the feelings of control, self-esteem and value.  When an employee has confidence and feels valued, there is a certain boldness and willingness to step forward and try new things without over-worrying the situation.  But, when the feelings are the opposite, there is a paralysis that settles in that can carry over into a general concern about what is next, small and big.

I heard a Pastor tell the story of when he was first approached to consider becoming a Minister.  He was a teenager and his church the Pastor at the time had asked him to consider the profession.  The then young man, said he didn’t really know what he was supposed to do with his life. The older Pastor said to him, “If you saw a city full of shoeless people, might you not consider becoming a cobbler?”  There is no question that we are to work to expand God’s Kingdom and we don’t have to look further than in Romans Chapter 12 so that we don’t need to ask, “What should I do next?”, when it comes to God’s desires for us.

Reference: Romans 12:6 (New Living Translation)