Las Vegas was the backdrop, but this honor was about a body of work that has been shaping radio for years.
At the 2026 NAB Show, Mentoring and Inspiring Women in Radio presented Mike McVay with the Erica Farber Impact Award, recognizing his contributions to advancing leadership opportunities for women in radio. The honor was part of MIW’s NAB-week awards presentation.
For me, this one is personal.
I worked for Mike in Kansas, and I worked with him in Atlanta. So when I say he deserves the awards he gets, I am not saying it from the cheap seats. I am saying it from having watched the man work. I have seen the discipline. I have seen the preparation. I have seen the standards. I have seen how seriously he takes programming, talent, structure, and the craft of radio itself. In my world, Mike McVay is a programming scholar.
That is why this award fits him.
The Erica Farber Impact Award is not the kind of recognition you hand out just to fill a dinner program. It is tied to leadership and industry influence, and MIW’s own framing of the award centers on meaningful change and the advancement of women in radio.
Mike has spent a career making his presence felt in exactly those kinds of ways.
And the résumé backs it up. NAB’s speaker materials describe him as a 2025 National Radio Hall of Fame inductee, the 2025 recipient of NAB’s National Radio Award, a 2024 Giant of Broadcasting honoree, and the 2024 Broadcasters Foundation Leadership Award recipient.
But awards and résumés only tell part of the story.
What makes Mike different is that he has never treated radio like a shortcut business. He studies it. He works at it. He pushes people. He sharpens ideas. He expects excellence. He understands that great radio is not luck and it is not volume. It is structure, instinct, discipline, and a willingness to keep learning even after everybody already knows your name.
That is what I have always respected about him.
He does not just talk programming. He knows it. He lives it. He teaches it by the way he works. And if you have ever been around him in a real setting, you understand quickly that he is not playing at this. He is serious about the medium, serious about talent, and serious about making radio better than it was before he touched it.
That is impact.
That is leadership.
That is why a night like this in Las Vegas matters.
This was not simply Mike McVay being applauded for longevity. This was Mike McVay being recognized for influence. For substance. For the kind of contribution that leaves the business stronger than it was before. And for those of us who know him beyond the headline, that feels exactly right.
Mike McVay received MIW’s Erica Farber Impact Award.
And radio got this one right.
-JPS