What started as a four-month internship for Jenifer Greenwood has turned into a career of 29 years and counting. Throughout her career, Greenwood has relied on trusting in God for guidance to help her find opportunities for growth, including completing the executive MPA (EMPA) program at the BYU Marriott School of Business.
Greenwood earned a bachelor’s degree in English at Brigham Young University shortly before starting an internship with the Curriculum Department at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. After completing the internship, Greenwood was offered a part-time position, which turned into a full-time position as a copyeditor and eventually as assistant managing editor. “I did just about everything at the church magazines, except I didn’t do a lot of writing,” Greenwood says.
After a reorganization of several church departments, Greenwood moved to the Priesthood and Family Department as manager, a transition that pushed her outside of what was familiar and comfortable. “I had sacrificed a lot of time to stay at the magazines for as long as I did,” Greenwood shares. So, when the opportunity to transition roles arose, she was initially hesitant to recognize the prompting that the magazines were meant to be only a season of her life. “To be open to that career pivot was terrifying, but then I couldn’t do what I do now if I hadn’t taken that step into the unknown.”
She adds, “I went from a position where I was central to so much of the work that was going on to having to create a job description for myself in my new role.” Greenwood was pleased to find that in addition to making a bigger impact, she also had more opportunities to write and create in her new role. As a magazine editor, Greenwood had worked on publishing general conference addresses, but as a manager, she had the opportunity to accelerate the whole publishing process. Her improved process is still being used today—12 years after her initial changes.
But revamping publishing timelines isn’t the only case where Greenwood employs her organizational skills. “I like the neatness of putting things into boxes, and that drives the editor in me,” says Greenwood, who also enjoys working on patchwork quilts, playing The New York Times games, and filling in missing boxes in her family tree. (Greenwood admits she is drawn to something about neatly ordered squares.) While she has hobbies and passions outside of her work, she is grateful for a career that also brings her fulfillment. “I don’t really separate work and church because they are one and the same, and that is my passion,” she says.
While working for the Church, Greenwood felt a growing desire to continue her education. She had been working on her master’s degree in English when she started her first internship, but she never finished the degree. “That was such a regret,” Greenwood shares. “I felt really strongly that it was time to take what I always thought of as this little hole in my soul and just fix it.” Greenwood had some friends and colleagues who had done the EMPA program at BYU Marriott, and she decided to apply and was later accepted.
The option of taking in-person evening classes at the BYU Salt Lake Center helped Greenwood finish her master’s program without taking a break from her career. “Getting my MPA ended up being the most mind-expanding experience,” Greenwood shares. “The MPA has been useful to me in my career and instrumental in helping me be promoted, but I think the most valuable part of it is the relationships that I formed.”
The connections she made with other students in her program are still important to Greenwood today. “It has been interesting how the right people were in my path at the right time. So many of the connections were personal more than professional.” She says that getting together with friends from the program feels like spending time with family because they have so much shared history doing hard things.
Now, Greenwood enjoys collaborating with some of her EMPA classmates who also work for the Church. “We speak the MPA language—we can talk about carrying the pole or about storming, norming, and forming, or having the right people in the right seats.”
Greenwood is currently the director of policy and general officer support in the Priesthood and Family Department—the first woman to hold that position. She works on writing and editing the General Handbook: Serving in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints under the direction of church leaders and enjoys being part of the process that implements the revelation they receive. “I think it’s an opportunity to see revelation distill.”
Director of policy is not a position Greenwood expected to hold when she started as a temporary editing intern 29 years ago, but she has built her career from a seemingly simple philosophy: following her own passions and the direction of the Spirit.
