Megha Parekh, the 31-year-old senior vice president of the Jacksonville Jaguars, attributes her career rise to education-loving parents, who were immigrants from India.

She went from magna cum laude Harvard College and Harvard Law graduate to transactional lawyer at Proskauer Rose in New York. After just three years at the international firm, Parekh, then 27, made a move usually associated with more seasoned lawyers: outside counsel to in-house chief legal officer of a football team.