In addition, the annual retainer is frequentlyaugmented by extra fees for attending board andspecial committee meetings.
Perks such as stocks also awarded at times.
Overseer Thomas S. Murphy, chair and chiefexecutive officer of Capital Cities/ABC, sits onthe board of corporate heavyweights such as IBM,Johnson & Johnson and Texaco--all of them membersof the Standard & Poors 500 Index.
For his work at IBM, Murphy received a $55,000annual retainer last year as well as an additional$5,000 for serving as chair of IBM's ExecutiveCompensation and Management Resources Committee.IBM also awarded Murphy 100 shares of thecompany's stock upon completion of his membershipyear.
In addition, Murphy received $53,000 fromJohnson & Johnson and approximately $60,000 from.Texaco in 1993. In total, Murphy garnered morethan $ 170,000 from the three public corporations.
Chait says such practices are not exclusive toacademic institutions.
"It's a common practice," Chait says. "The vastmajority of those serving on trust boards arepeople who serve on boards of directors offor-profit corporations."
Terrence L. Moore, chief of characterand ethics development at the U.S. Air ForceAcademy, says there is an upper limit to thenumber of other boards a member can sit on.
"There is only so much time they can come togrips with all the information to make decisions,"Moore says. "They've got to have the time toconsider the issues."
That is the University's concern too, accordingto Robert. He says that as part of the process ofelecting overseers and Corporation members Harvardevaluates whether candidates will have enough timeto watch over the University.
"The only thing the University is in theposition to do is to consider the amount to timethey [governing board members] have," Robert says.
And ultimately, says Corporation member Smith,it is up to Harvard to decide whether there shouldbe a cap on corporate commitments. To this point,there appears to be no official limit.
"There is an upper limit somewhere," Smithsays. "It's the judgment of the management."