Unless I'm completely mistaken, the capital commitments refers to investments the Harvard endowment is making in other funds, not investments being made in its

Unless I'm completely mistaken, the capital commitments refers to investments the Harvard endowment is making in other funds, not investments being made in its own fund. For example, when a VC firm raises a new fund, they don't take delivery of the entire amount of the fund, they just get commitments that the funds will be available from investors (like Harvard, in this case) when needed. It's not unreasonable for an endowment fund with tens of billions of dollars to commit roughly $1.1 billion per year to various investments over the coming decade. As far as paying bonuses of tens of millions of dollars to the managers of the endowment, Harvard has to compete for qualified managers, too. If they offered $250k or whatever the professors get paid, it's doubtful that they'd get any qualified applicants. (And yes, I'm aware that the guy they hired apparently wasn't qualified either, but that's not the point.)