Key Money Goal: Risk Management

Beginning of article

In the business of running your individual or family finances in the mid-1990s, overseeing the cash flow and investing for a worthwhile reward fulfills only half of the job description.

The other half, as increasing numbers of advisers are coming to see, consists of what modern corporate America calls "risk management."

In just the past few months, the investment world has witnessed two dramatic news developments _ the bankruptcy of Orange County, Calif., and the collapse of a venerable British bank _ that amounted to failures in risk management.

These were crashes that could have been prevented, just about everybody agrees, if better measures to …