This week’s highlights:  Success in College, Managing the Helmsley Trust, and The Magic of Bees.

Fifteen on Friday – 08/17/18 – Issue 297

Happy Friday Everyone –

Periodically I post updates of a few interesting books that may be worth your time (in addition to your regular reading from Fifteen on Friday).  It had been a few months, so I posted an update yesterday with 3 books I think you will enjoy.

Have a great weekend,

David

Food for Thought:

1. NYT – How to Get the Most Out of College  They’re privileged, pivotal years. Navigate them with as much care as you did the path that got you there.
2. IndependentUK – London is over. Like thousands of young people, I’m so glad I chose to leave  It’s only 50 miles from our previous home, but it feels worlds away – and my mental health improved almost overnight
3. BA – Bribes, Backdoor Deals, and Pay to Play: How Bad Rosé Took Over  A sommelier opens up about the shady business practices that are behind the rise of watery, terrible rosé.
4. NYT – How to Quantify a Nurse’s ‘Gut Feelings’  I had a nagging sense that something was wrong, but I couldn’t articulate it.
5. Strategy& – How to Cultivate Leadership That Is Honed to Solve Problems  Achieve breakthroughs by bringing together experts who love challenges.

Business/Economics:

1. AWCS – The Half-Life of Investment Strategies
2. Guardian – Where even Walmart won’t go: how Dollar General took over rural America
3. TheAtlantic – The Strange Infinities of e-Commerce  When it costs as much to retail 200,000 things as one thing, the world gets a little odd.
4. CAP – Interview with Roz Hewsenian. CIO of the Helmsely Trust, Hewsenian has had a wide ranging career.  More interesting is her opportunistic approach to endowment fund management, accompanied by a measure of forced concentration in positions.
5. CEO Mag – T-Shaped Stars: The Backbone of IDEO’s Collaborative Culture.  IDEO is famous for its method of innovation based on intense cross-disciplinary project work. To pull this off, the company has long practiced the art of collaboration and the development of a certain kind of talent: T-shaped people.

Culture/Tech/Science:

1. NYT – The Super Bowl of Beekeeping  Almond growing in California is a $7.6 billion industry that wouldn’t be possible without the 30 billion bees (and hundreds of human beekeepers) who keep the trees pollinated — and whose very existence is in peril.
2. NewsObserver – ‘Like you just have no brain after the game.’   Inside a UNC lineman’s concussion ordeal.
3. NYT – Kenan Thompson, the Reluctant Star of ‘Saturday Night Live’  He has always been most comfortable as a supporting player. The longest tenure on the show and an Emmy nomination have helped change that state of mind.
4. Vox – It’s easy to become obese in America. These 7 charts explain why. In America, the unhealthiest foods are the tastiest foods, the cheapest foods, the largest-portion foods.”
5. NYT – Give a Cow a Brush, and Watch It Scratch That Itch  Some researchers think mechanical brushes aren’t just some spa amenity for dairy cows — they’re important to the animal’s well-being.