Terminated, not retired

Bank notes 1: Oops! The vice-president who had to be, uh, persuaded by the sheriff to return the company car last weekend did not voluntarily retire. It seems the VP was terminated for cause.

As for the senior vice-president (in whose home the company car was parked), the officer has been handed a 30-day suspension and has been asked to explain within 45 days why the bank shouldn’t fire her too.

Basically, the SVP will have to show there has been no conflict of interest in her dealings with the VP, who is, to use an entertainment buzzword, just a friend. The two officers are both married (but not to each other), with children, although the marriage of one is said to have been recently annulled.

Meanwhile, an officer-in-charge has already been named to head the SVP’s division.

* * *

Bank notes 2: Nothing would have stopped Citibank global consumer bank head Nina Aguas – and nothing did – from attending the launch of the bank-sponsored reading program for two public schools in Quezon City.

You see, Ms. Aguas, who is organizationally the same level as Citi country corporate head Jim Hunt, is a product of a provincial school. Her parents, both school teachers, wouldn’t have been able to send all their children to school without the help of their older children.

The reading program which targets grades 1 to 3 students is being funded by a $25,000 grant from the New York-based Citigroup Foundation and will be supported by Citi employees who have volunteered to spend time with these children on Saturdays.

* * *

As a result of its alliance with Grant Thornton, the auditing firm of Punongbayan and Araullo has just set up a family business consultancy service.

Initially, a group of seven (three of partnership level and four of senior level officers) have trained with Grant Thornton’s international family business consultant Clayton Hebberd.

Basically, the new service deals help entrepreneurs with their long-term business plans – you know, stuff like how much should a family member-manager be paid and who is going to run the company when the current family member-chief executive officer dies.

Obviously, the nature of the business is very long-term and could result in a profitable relationship that will not only benefit P&A but also its network of lawyers (inheritance) to investment bankers (wealth management).

As everybody knows, P&A’s former partner, Ernst & Young (which has since allied itself with SGV & Co)., prefers to deal with Fortune 500 companies.

The market of Grant Thornton has traditionally been the emerging as well as successful entrepreneurs. In this part of the world, that means dealing with businesses set up by ethnically Chinese families, where face and guanxi (or relationships) are paramount.