Community Service Award
WINNER
Evan Farber
General Counsel
and Corporate Secretary
The Advisory Board Company
Last year, Evan Farber co-chaired the annual Helping Children Soar Benefit for the Children’s Law Center. More than 400 people filled the Roof Terrace Restaurant at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in recognition of the 2,000 children helped each year by the CLC.
For Farber, general counsel and corporate secretary for The Advisory Board Company in D.C., the evening turned out to be a major achievement in a career already filled with generosity and pro-bono work. The benefit raised more than $750,000 -- the most in the CLC’s 16-year history.
“Evan’s strategic capability shone through” as the event’s co-chair, says Judith Sandalow, executive director of District-based CLC. “Rather than focus only on one-time dollars, Evan built relationships. He brought together a host committee of new supporters who themselves broadened CLC’s base of support.”
Farber’s approach to fundraising calls to mind his successful legal work and collaborative management style at the Advisory Board, a leading provider of comprehensive performance-improvement services to the healthcare and education sectors. As general counsel, Farber oversees a 16-person legal department. He takes pride in developing young talent, which often means mentoring and providing growth opportunities to in-house attorneys and paraprofessionals.
“Career paths at law firms can be more linear than an in-house legal department,” Farber says, “and I enjoy finding creative ways to ensure that team members are honing their skills, becoming engaged in the business and advancing within the company.”
Outside junior associates also benefit from his coach-like mindset. He believes that the current economic conditions have made it more difficult for junior associates at law firms to get the same amount and quality of training that he received when the economy was stronger.
“I make an effort to work out billing arrangements with law firms so that my team and I can spend more time with junior associates … in mentoring relationships,” he says. “I have helped several law firm associates find in-house opportunities and have spent a significant amount of time [helping] associates deliver more value to their clients.”
Farber is clearly delivering tremendous value himself. In 2011, the Advisory Board gave him its highest honor, the David Bradley Leadership Award, which is named after the company’s founder. In the community, Farber was chosen as current vice chairman of the 18-member board of trustees at the Concord Hill School in Chevy Chase, Md., which his two sons attend.
“My real next professional ambition,” he says, “is to develop one or more of my attorneys into a future general counsel of a complex organization.”
Meanwhile, the pro-bono relationship between The Advisory Board Company and the Children’s Law Center continues to grow. The company donated 158 hours of expertise in the past year in areas such as executive coaching for CLC’s management staff and modeling the financial return of a CLC investment. The Advisory Board also has become CLC’s pro-bono partner in the Children’s Hospital Medical-Legal Partnership Leadership Circle, which brings together six of the top medical-legal partnerships nationwide.
Pro-bono and nonprofit work can be some of the most interesting and challenging, Farber says. He looks back fondly on providing corporate structuring and governance guidance to the American National Red Cross and the Jane Goodall Institute. He met Goodall several times and received stuffed chimpanzee toys for his sons as tokens of the institute’s appreciation.
Prior to joining the Advisory Board, Farber was a partner at Hogan & Hartson in D.C. He holds a law degree from the George Washington School of Law (where he was editor-in-chief of the Public Contract Law Journal) and a philosophy degree from the State University of New York at Binghamton.
In addition to his mentoring and pro bono work, Farber enjoys coaching his sons’ flag football teams and participating in their baseball practices.
COMMUNITY SERVICE AWARD | finalist
David Miller
General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer
SkyLink Aviation Inc.
From his 15 years in the Army, David Miller learned to lead by example. From two of his six children -- 11-year-old sons Joseph and William, who both have autism and do not speak -- he learned “that all individuals, no matter what their disability, have skills and talents that need to be developed and given expression.”
The results of Miller’s dual inspirations are most evident at Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA), one of the nation’s largest community colleges. Miller, who is general counsel and chief compliance officer for both Dulles-based SkyLink USA and its Toronto-based parent, SkyLink Aviation Inc., has been a NOVA trustee for eight years, including the past two as board chairman.
During his tenure, Miller helped NOVA become better attuned to veterans, active duty military and their families. GI Jobs Magazine now recognizes NOVA as a premier institution for veterans seeking job training and integration. Special-needs students also enjoy improved access and training programs at NOVA -- partly because Miller worked with the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., to appropriate $55 million for post-secondary programs geared toward students with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Miller’s efforts have not gone unnoticed. In 2009, he testified before the Senate HELP Committee about the need for community colleges to train students with disabilities for independent lives and meaningful employment. The Association of Community College Trustees gave him its Trustee Leadership Award for the Southern Region in 2012. NOVA President Robert Templin Jr. recently described him as offering “tireless work” and “dynamic leadership” -- two traits that have made Miller indispensable at SkyLink.
SkyLink is a global logistics provider with particular expertise in aviation support. Aided by a small in-house legal staff, Miller handles legal and compliance challenges in turbulent countries such as Uganda, Afghanistan, Sudan and Iraq. SkyLink clients include the United Nations, the U.S. Department of State, the UAE Special Operations Command and the ministries of defense of Britain, Germany, Italy and Canada.
Among Miller’s specific responsibilities at SkyLink are litigation and contract review, human resources, government audits, international compliance and providing overall legal counsel to the company’s sales and business units. His influence has been more personal as well; SkyLink now provides career and vocational training for veterans and people with special needs.
Prior to joining SkyLink, Miller spent 20 years in private practice, focusing mainly on the legal, regulatory and legislative issues facing trade associations and private companies around the world.
He joined the Army in 1970 -- the same year he earned his bachelor’s degree in government from Boston University -- and retired 15 years later, after serving in a variety of airborne and special-forces units. In 1975, he completed his master’s in public administration from Northeastern University. Five years later, he had earned his law degree from George Mason University.
In addition to his involvement with Northern Virginia Community College, Miller is a member of the Fairfax County Auxiliary Police, a trustee of the Northern Virginia Workforce Development Board, and a member of the board of directors of the Jewish Community Center.
He also enjoys participating in marathons and triathlons -- typically training very early in the morning or very late at night. He acknowledges that raising an autistic child (let alone two) can put “tremendous pressure” on a family, but “luckily I’m married to an amazing woman,” he says of his wife, Lynn. Their four other children are Andrew, 26; Casey, 23; Sarah, 16; and Sallie, 11, who is a triplet with her autistic brothers, Joseph and William.