Best Business Commentary

How to be a great boss

“Most bosses want to be great,” says Leigh Buchanan in Inc.com. As we approach “National Boss Day” tomorrow, we might consider some “universal habits of great bosses,” as compiled by a “perpetual underling.” Great bosses “know when they’re not wanted,” and recognize that even the “most unassuming” of them makes workers “mildly uncomfortable.” They understand “the small picture” of the company, as seen by individual employees. Great bosses take time to figure out and remember what individual employees do, so they can “make unforced appreciative reference” to a worker’s accomplishments. “And employees, in return, remember them.”

Black Monday, revisited

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What did you do when the stock market crashed “20 years ago this week”? says John Wasik in Bloomberg. “I froze.” Luckily, “it turns out my passivity was the best course.” But there will be “more crashes and bear markets,” even with the “many institutional safeguards” in place today to “curb market freefalls and ensure liquidity.” To manage the risks to your portfolio, diversify your holdings and “concentrate on your life plan.” What are your long- and short-term goals, and how much risk can you take on? If you can protect your portfolio “against inflation, loss of future income, and the ravages of bear markets,” you can “make that next crash insignificant.”