Obliquity is the title of a new book by John Kay, former director of Oxford's Business School and current Financial Times columnist. A core thesis in this work, per a recent review in The Wall Street Journal ("The Long Way Around," 4/12/2011), is that the best way to maximize profits is to avoid a conscious effort at doing so.

Instead, seek to do right by your customers and employees, and your business is bound to prosper. In other words, seek to do well by doing right.

Something that often short-sighted CFOs and controllers should take to heart. Reminds me of a time when I was a lonely voice in Merrill Lynch arguing that two dramatic cuts (with a cumulative effect of a 50% reduction) in the redemption value of Visa rewards points was unethical and bound to damage client relations, especially since they were done with no prior warning, to avoid a rush of redemptions. The bean counters could not see that this move was not good business sense, never mind the issue of right and wrong. The expected short-term earnings boost inevitably would be offset by client defections and lingering ill-will among those who remained.

We've already noted how small lenders see the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill as unduly burdensome for them. A recent Bloomberg Businessweek article ("Federal Rules Favor Too-Big-to-Fail Banks," 4/11/2011) cites further evidence.

A rule that forces loan officers to be salaried, not commissioned, is pushing out independent mortgage brokers. As noted in the link above, rules requiring banks to keep at least 5% of securitized mortgages on their books will be too onerous for many community banks, which will be forced to contract or fold. Large banks also seemed poised to control the new derivatives clearinghouses. The list goes on and on.

The upshot for you? Career opportunities with the little guys in the banking industry look a lot less promising right now.

According to a report in today's Financial Times ("Citi plans 500-plus hiring spree in bid to close gap with rivals"), Citigroup looks to add more investment bankers and traders over the next two years. The company lost ground in recent years to rivals such as JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, which took advantage of instability in the industry to make acquisitions and raiding top talent. A high-profile recent hire by Citigroup is former Obama administration budget director Peter Orszag.

Critics are concerned about the expense increases that this expansion will entail at the troubled firm, but others note that adding 500 heads (even 500 high-priced ones) should be only marginally significant in a division that already employs over 24,000. Moreover, the new hiring largely replaces talent that departed due to constraints on bonuses occasioned by the federal bailout of Citigroup.

Costs associated with obtaining an EMBA are rising, in several respects. Tuition hikes are one thing, reduction or elimination of corporate sponsorship is another. Only 30% of EMBA students are fully reimbursed by their employers, down from 37% in 2005.

Then there's the time factor. A rapidly growing percentage of EMBA students endure increasingly lengthy trips to their schools, in search of higher-profile programs. Follow the link above for more detail.