Regional Manager | Eastern Utah Community Credit Union
Rancher | Hatch Livestock
Joël Hatch-Jensen has had two accidental careers in her life—and she’s handling them simultaneously.
Starting as a part-time bank teller in rural Utah, Hatch-Jensen rose rapidly through the ranks at Zions Bank, where she credits strong mentorship and training programs for her career progression to Huntington branch manager. When she wasn’t working, you could find her in the buddy seat of a tractor and visiting with her husband, Jordan, while he completed chores on their farm.
In 2012, Jordan drove up Gentry Mountain to help the U.S. Forest Service reseed areas that had been burned in a wildfire. On the way back down, he lost his life in an accident. Hatch-Jensen says forcing herself to go to work every morning kept her sane, and her colleagues at the bank supported her through her grief. “It was a while before my brain started working very well,” she says. “I had incredible co-workers, and they would make sure I didn’t mess anything up.”
While family farms are dwindling across the country, Hatch-Jensen says selling the farm after Jordan’s passing never occurred to her. She believes the farm helped shape her children into incredible people, and she wanted their children to have the same opportunities. Her learning curve was steep, though. In-laws, neighbors and even farm retailers pitched in to teach her how to operate the equipment and care for the animals. “Now, I am a professional at going up and restringing my balers,” she says. “I never claim to be good at mechanics, but I can fix a lot of things because I had to learn.”
Hatch-Jensen says maintaining her banking and farming careers has given her an opportunity to make a difference in the lives around her, whether it’s helping someone build credit from start to finish—allowing them to progress toward a car or a home—or providing high-quality, affordable beef to customers worldwide. She often visits schools to teach students about her work. Sometimes, she speaks about cows, fencing rights and water rights. Sometimes, she speaks about deposits and loans.
Hatch-Jensen is also making a difference for farmers, giving voice to their concerns when well-meaning federal and environmental groups promote burdensome restrictions without considering practical consequences. In one such case, the Utah Cattlemen’s Association and the Utah Farm Bureau asked Hatch-Jensen to publicly represent a perspective; legislators and the U.S. Forest Service listened. “It did make a difference to us, and it really made a difference later on for other cattlemen,” she says.
Hatch-Jensen currently acts as regional manager for Eastern Utah Community Credit Union. She has served on the state board of directors for the Utah Farm Bureau, on the board of trustees for Castleview Hospital, on the Utah State University Eastern advisory council, as the president of the Emery County Farm Bureau, and was elected vice-chairperson of the Emery County Republican Party.
“My dad was a school teacher for the severely handicapped, and in the summer, he would take other jobs,” Hatch-Jensen says. “He taught me I could do anything I wanted to do.”
Connect with Joël Hatch-Jensen on LinkedIn.
