She graduated from Greenwich Academy and Smith College, where she spent her junior year studying archeology at the University of Sydney.

[3] Life proclaimed her one of the "million-dollar faces" in the beauty industry; select models who were able to negotiate previously unheard-of lucrative and exclusive deals with giant cosmetics companies, were instantly recognizable, and whose names became known to the general public.

[4] Hack's feature-film debut was a bit part in Woody Allen's Academy Award-winning film Annie Hall (1977) as "Street Stranger."

Shortly thereafter she was cast as Kate Jackson's replacement on the television series Charlie's Angels, playing the sophisticated character Tiffany Welles for one season (1979–1980).

She starred with Annette O'Toole and Meredith Baxter Birney in Vanities (1981), a television production of the comedy-drama stage play about the lives, loves and friendship of three Texas cheerleaders starting from high school to post-college graduation; it aired as a part of Standing Room Only, a series on the premium-television channel HBO.

In addition to several more notable appearances in film and television and on stage, she narrated the audiobook The Lord of Hawkfell Island, for which AudioFile stated "Shelley Hack's mellifluous voice brings this Viking tale alive.

"[8] In 1984, Hack was hired to replace Paula Kelly and portray new public defender Christine Sullivan - who was going to be romantically involved with Judge Harry Stone (Harry Anderson) - on the sitcom Night Court, But when the series started shooting, Hack and producer Reinhold Weege realized there was a problem.

[citation needed] Hack completed a master's degree in business administration from New York Institute of Technology[9] and shortly afterward (unofficially) retired from acting.

[9] Shelley Hack became a voting registration and polling station supervisor in the 1997 elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina and produced the first-ever televised presidential debates there as well.

In 1997, Hack founded the Shelley Hack Media Consultancy (SHMC), where, over the course of ten years, she worked with the largest media conglomerate in Eastern Europe,[9] primarily focused on the television sector, creating ethnically diverse television programs in Eastern Europe.

Additionally, she became a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy (PCIP), which is an independent, non-partisan, membership-based organization dedicated to global engagement.