Rutendo was born and educated in Zimbabwe. He has been a member of Zimhealth since 2009 and was the Chairman during 2012 to 2015. He is the current Secretary General since 2018.

Rutendo has been working for the World Health Organization (WHO) Headquarters based at Geneva, Switzerland since January 2009 in the area of Regulation of Health Technologies. He has previous work experience at the medicines regulatory authority in Zimbabwe with his regulatory career spanning more than 25 years.

His inspiration is to improve regulatory control in the evaluation and supply of safe, effective, good quality and affordable medicines in resource limited settings and improving the capacity of resource limited countries to regulate medicines.