Another newcomer to the list is Graphic Packaging's Lauren Tashma. Last year, her cash take-home pay was $600,171: this included a $461,670 salary and $138,501 in nonequity incentives. Tashma also received nearly $760,000 in stock awards last year.

Tashma joined Graphic Packaging as GC in early 2014. Her in-house career began in 1998, when she joined Fortune Brands Inc. In 2010, as Fortune divided into three companies, she oversaw the spinoff of Fortune Brands Home & Security Inc. That was completed by 2011, at which point she became GC and secretary at Fortune Brands Home & Security, where she remained until the move to Graphic Packaging.

As of late 2014, Tashma oversees a legal department with six attorneys in Atlanta and one at European headquarters in Brussels. She has said that the job of GC is “24/7.”