How to Be a Boss: 16 Tips from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina

by Dayna Winter

Photo collage of the cast of Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. From left to right Hilda Spellman (Lucy Davis), Harvey Kinkle (Ross Lynch), Sabrina Spellman (Kiernan Shipka), Susie Putnam (Lachlan Watson) and Zelda Spellman (Miranda Otto) So you wanna be a boss. Netflix and chill will yourself to get off the couch already. How to Be a Boss (According to Your Favorite Shows) is your excuse to binge all the TV you want. It’s career inspiration, right? As for me, chain-watching teen dramas now qualifies as research to bring you this informative series. We all win.

On the night of her dark baptism, Sabrina Spellman decided that, no, she’d rather not work for The Man, and took her destiny into her own hands. (Okay, so she eventually signed up with the Dark Lord, but we all have setbacks. Even witches.) In Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, our heroine is caught between two worlds: juggling half-mortal life with a half-witch twilight side gig, astral-projecting around to perform random acts of magic and meddling. When does she sleep? (Do witches need sleep? No matter—it’s all in the pursuit of getting to the top.)

Yes, muggle, like me, you can’t cast spells on the competition or make debt vanish or see the future through a malum malus. You’ll just have to chase bossdom the good old-fashioned way. But you can still learn a thing or two from Sabrina’s consistent bumbling (pesky human half, I banish thee!) in her quest to be a boss. We bring you 16 lessons for life and business—no magic required—from the witches and witch-adjacent of Greendale.

1. Being a boss is hard work, but don’t burn the candle at both ends (lest you summon your inner demons).
Sabrina Spellman lights a match in a dark hallway while a demon stands behind her in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Jeff Weddell/Netflix
2. …and if you do, practice some self care. Sleep like the dead (or with them) whenever you can.
Sabrina Spellman sits on a stretcher in a mortuary speaking to a man with his back turned. The room is lit by several candles.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
3. When they go low, you go high.
Harvey and Theo stand in the Greendale High gym, facing a character with his back turned. Theo is holding a basketball.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
4. Stop at nothing to reach your goals (even if it means knocking out competition with a bout of chicken pox).
Sabrina Spellman slow dances with Nick at a Valentine’s Day dance in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
5. Get energized for your busy day of bossdom with a balanced breakfast of eye of newt fruit and feather of fowl toast.
Sabrina Spellman sits at her kitchen table with her aunts Zelda and Hilda and cousin Ambrose in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. The table is covered in breakfast plates, and Aunt Zelda is smoking a cigarette.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
6. Remember that body language is everything.
Sabrina Spellman stands with arms outstretched in a darkened room in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
7. Surround yourself with people who support you no matter what. Even mortals will do.
Ros, Harvey and Theo stand in a row, looking concerned at something off camera in an outdoor scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
8. …and support them, too. But witch, please, there’s no need to bring magic into it.
Sabrina Spellman stands smiling in the bleachers of the Greendale High gym in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
9. Make careful alliances. Sometimes chosen family > real family.
The Weird Sisters stand in a row with Prudence in the foreground, addressing a man off camera in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
10. Challenge tradition and make your own rules. Who says a girl can’t be Top Boy?
Sabrina Spellman and Nick draw symbols on the ground during a match for Top Boy in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
11. …or even High Priest. Topple. That. Patriarchy.
Father Blackwood stands at his desk in his office at the academy in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
12. Be your true self.
Theo, wearing a suit at the Valentine’s dance, looks off camera in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
13. …and don’t be held back by your limitations. They can only make you stronger (like, who needs sight when you have sight).
Ros sits in a chair in a medical office while an ophthalmologist speaks with her father in the foreground in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
14. Do things, tell people.
Sabrina Spellman stands in a wooded area by a large rock blowing into a bugle-like instrument in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
15. When stakes are high, engage only your most trusted advisors (or familiars).
Salem the black cat and Sabrina Spellman’s familiar stands in a dark room in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
16. Lastly, why stop at boss when you can be queen?
Sabrina Spellman dances in a gold dress and mask in a scene from Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.
Diyah Pera/Netflix
Feature image by Niall McClelland
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