Contact: Sameera Jordan
Media Relations Manager
Sameera.Jordan@BankWithUnited.com

As part of our job, we meet a lot of United Bank employees. We speak to them, learn their stories, and try to piece together who they are and what makes them tick. We had heard quite a bit about Sierra Hood in the last year and already knew she was a rising star at the Company. Our CEO even gave her a shoutout during a recent company meeting, remarking, “She moved all the way from Hawaii to Charleston, South Carolina, as a single mom with two young children!” Leaders sang her praises left and right.

However, what we didn’t expect upon meeting her was just how humble she’d be. “Sorry, I’m a little nervous,” she said at the start of our call. We assured her that there was no need to be nervous and that the team just wanted to learn a bit more about her life and maybe get the chance to share her story with others. We spoke for over an hour, and we really got to know Sierra Hood. Yes, she’s from Hawaii, and yes, she’s a mom of two, but that’s not where her story begins or ends. We want to paint the full picture of her life.

So, on that note, we’d like you to meet Sierra Hood.

Born and raised in Pearl City, on the island of Oahu, Sierra Hood grew up in the company of strong women. From her grandmother, who experienced the devastation of the attack on Pearl Harbor firsthand on the day of her third birthday, to her mother, who spent most of Sierra’s childhood as a single mom – Sierra and her family had a great life, but it wasn’t without struggles.

As a child, Sierra thought of joining the Navy. And although her grandfather served, and her grandmother was a lifelong volunteer, it was childlike dreams of travel that drew her to the profession. “Hawaii is beautiful, but I never left as a kid. I wanted to get out there, see different parts of the world, and learn about other cultures,” she told us.

However, just a year out of high school, Sierra welcomed her first child – a daughter – followed by her son a few years later. And while she had to put her grand plans of travel on hold for a time, things were good. She and her children’s father decided that Sierra would be a stay-at-home mom and take care of the home while also pursuing a college education online. After a few years, she received an associate’s degree in business administration from the University of Phoenix and began working towards a bachelor's.

It wasn’t until she separated from her children’s father that she began reconsidering her options. She made the tough choice to put finishing her bachelor’s degree on the back burner and decided it was time for a move. “I knew that in order for me to truly break free and be the role model that my children needed me to be, I had to get off that island and start fresh,” she said. So, at 28 years old, with two children under the age of 10, Sierra packed her family up and moved to Charleston, SC, in 2015 to stay with family.

We asked her if she experienced culture shock moving to South Carolina. After all, anyone who has ever visited Hawaii understands that these are two entirely different worlds. We couldn’t imagine starting over more than 5,000 miles away, in a city we’d never visited, with family we had only met once.

And this was exactly the case for Sierra, who “couldn’t even point to Charleston on a map before the move.” But not easily phased, she took the move in stride.

She says the day they landed in Charleston, she instantly began setting goals. “I made a list of things I wanted to accomplish: Find a job, save money, buy a house, and take my children on vacation – something I never got to do as a child or an adult up till that point in my life,” she recalled.

Almost right away, Sierra says she found work at a hotel. It was a front desk job, and she was excited about the prospect of making her own money. She also credits this job as what eventually led her to banking. She tells the story of a normal day at work when a guest began speaking to Sierra about her job at Wells Fargo and how she thought Sierra should apply for a job there. She says she didn’t take this interaction seriously and forgot about the suggestion almost instantly. But as fate would have it, short staffing of maintenance workers meant she was asked to deliver a new microwave to the woman’s room a few days later. And when the woman recognized Sierra, she asked her if she’d applied for the job yet.

We want to pause here for a moment to describe the kind of energy Sierra Hood gives off. For anyone who hasn’t had a chance to meet her, she has a very warm and friendly personality, which she attributes to her Hawaiian heritage. You know the kind of person who can hold a conversation with anyone and make you feel like you’ve known them forever? That’s Sierra. And this would, of course, catch the eye of a business leader in such a relationship-based and customer service-centric industry as banking.

So, the woman pushed and pushed and convinced Sierra to complete the application on the spot. Soon after, Sierra got the job, began working as a teller, and immediately fell in love.

She continued her career with Wells Fargo for two years, eventually being promoted to a banker. Then, she was recruited by Edward Jones to work as a financial advisor, where she received her Series 7, 66, and Life and Accidental Health licenses. But the hustle of the job wasn’t easy for a single mom with two young children. So, she returned to Wells Fargo as a licensed personal banker, which allowed her to continue doing some of the work she’d come to enjoy. She eventually left to join a newer, small community bank called Beacon Community Bank, where she wore many hats and got to try her hand at different work across lines of business. Specifically, Sierra says this role was where she was bitten by the credit bug. “That was my favorite part of the job. If someone came in for a loan, I would jump on it like ‘I can help you!’ because it was my favorite kind of work,” she told us.

But that is where her career at Beacon ended. Her old manager had left, and once again asked Sierra to come work with her at her new job, with United Bank.

Now a branch manager at United, Sierra has set her sights on new goals. She’s had several jobs, saved up, bought and sold a house, and regularly goes on family vacations with her kids. D.C. has been her favorite, and she admits that she’d love to make a move there one day. But for now, the Credit department is her latest venture. Sierra was part of United’s inaugural Credit Preparatory Program, a seven-month program designed to prepare employees for a career in Credit. She says she received the email about applications and just knew she had to apply. Admittedly not one to brag, Sierra surprised us with the confidence with which she said, “I just knew I would be great at the job!” And when a credit position eventually became available, she didn’t hesitate to fill out an application. In July 2025, Sierra will begin her new role as a credit analyst in the same office where she currently serves as branch manager.

But Sierra has much to celebrate outside of just her career successes. Today, her daughter is the same age as Sierra was when she gave birth to her, and she couldn’t be prouder of her firstborn. Her daughter is her “mini-me,” but a better version, she says. “She gets good grades, she’s very independent, she’s a great driver. She’s everything I could have ever hoped she’d become!” The two are even enrolled in classes together at Trident Technical College, and her daughter has expressed a desire to one day follow in her footsteps and become a banker, just like her mom.

Sierra is also now just six classes away from earning an associate’s degree in accounting. She doesn’t know if – with the combined classes she’s taken at the University of Phoenix and Trident – she has enough credits to earn a bachelor’s degree, but that’s certainly something she’d like to accomplish. Now that her daughter has graduated and her son is in high school, earning her degree is definitely a goal that she’s set for herself, possibly in the next few years before her 40th birthday.

While she describes her education journey as an “insecurity,” she’s very quick to note that it isn’t just for her own benefit. “I want to show my children that it’s OK if you don’t accomplish things in the normal order that society expects you to,” she said. “I’ve learned that you just have to keep your head high. It’ll happen when it’s meant to happen.”

She also hopes to set an example for other women at an impasse in their lives. “Change can be terrifying,” she remarked. “When I left home, I didn’t know what the future had in store for me. I just knew that I needed to make a change if I wanted to create a better life for my children and me.

“I’ve never regretted the decisions I have made. I’ve only regretted the ones I didn’t make and the opportunities I let pass me by. I hope my story encourages other women to go out on a limb and also take a chance on themselves. I promise you the risk is worth the reward.”

If we had to use one word to describe Sierra Hood, it would be “fearless.” Not many people have the courage to make the changes she’s made, nor the drive to continue pushing to get more out of life. But what truly sets her apart is her resilience. No matter how many times she’s had to start over or how many times life threw a wrench in her plans, she has never once backed down from a challenge or shied away from an opportunity. She’s a mom, a banker, a leader, and a dreamer. She won’t let anyone tell her there’s something that she cannot do, and good luck to anyone who tries to stand in her way.