There’s a guy called John Hennessy on the Google Main Board. There’s also a guy called John Hennessy who is President of Stanford. And guess what? They’re the same chap! Dan Gillmor quotes what the WSJ wrote about this…

In the month of November, John L. Hennessy, president of Stanford University, made $1 million. It didn’t come from his day job.

Mr. Hennessy, an engineer who co-founded a semiconductor company, has used his talents, Silicon Valley connections and academic position to help win billions of dollars for Stanford. He has done well for himself, too. Mr. Hennessy’s November haul included a $75,000 retainer from Cisco Systems Inc., on whose board he sits, plus $133,000 in restricted Cisco stock, proceeds of $452,000 from selling stock in Atheros Communications Inc., where he is co-founder and chairman, and a $384,000 profit from the exercise of Google Inc. stock options. He sits on Google’s board.

That month makes up only one part of an income stream that many in academia consider without precedent for a university president. In the past five years, through exclusive investments and relationships with companies, Mr. Hennessy has collected fees, stock and paper stock-option profits totaling $43 million, securities filings show. That dwarfs his $616,000 annual compensation at Stanford, where he has been president since 2000.