I have been part of the Leverton’s team (officially) since 1996. I joined because I was curious about the business as it had been a massive part of my life for as long as I could remember. As a relatively young child I learnt to answer our home landline properly to grieving families (no mobiles back then) and I got used to my dad being called out day and night. I was taken to the beautiful gardens at Golders Green Crematorium for “a wander” and regularly spent time with our guys watching them make coffins in our workshop and look after the Rolls Royce cars whilst I played in the sawdust. To me it was just our life and it was only as I got older, I realised that this perhaps was not the childhood everyone had. My parents split up when I was a young teenager so, I thought the best way to spend more time with my dad, was to join the “Firm”. Back then there were no female funeral directors out there looking after families. Women had a quiet, but essential, role arranging funerals, answering the phone and caring in a gentle way. The men wore their stripes, they used to remind of penguins, bringing the traffic to a standstill paging the way in front of the hearse and limousines, taking charge and making all the decisions.
That brings me to the most rewarding parts of my job – in the early days it was breaking down all the usual stereotypes that women can’t lead such an historic, masculine organisation and they simply can’t cope with conducting the funerals they arranged. This was a societal belief at that time, but my dad always said it was about time we saw a woman go out there show them how it’s done. So, terrified and shaky I began to step into the mysterious world of being a female funeral director. Regardless of my gender, the most rewarding part then, and now, was when a family on one of the hardest day of their lives would throw their arms around you and thank you for all you have done. I know I haven’t eased the pain of their loss but I feel immensely privileged that I have been allowed in to listen and guide a family, and simply put, make a difference.
These days I am involved much more in the mechanics of running the company: from HR, to our CRM, accounting and striving to evolve and improve the company. I am fiercely proud of what we do and our amazing staff. There is no one person more important than another and the team we have is simply incredible.
We now have more female funeral directors than males, and I am not knocking the men at all, everyone shines in their own light with their own particular strengths and talents. I well up with pride when I see our funerals going past; many times people have mentioned that there is “the Leverton’s way” and although I am not sure I can explain it fully I feel we do things the right way – funerals are looked after the same way whether there’s one person there or a 1,000. I am stickler for detail so presentation and perfection are really important to me so I look out for things that no one else notices – I know I drive my colleagues crazy sometimes but we only get one chance to get a funeral right.
I love the challenges that my role brings however one such challenge was a step too far for me – Covid 19. As a human it very nearly broke me, the same as others in our profession and the medics. I found it very hard when the we were all clapping for the NHS that no-one acknowledges the road we were forced to travel. It went against all the things we stand for – our offices being forces closed and simply saying “no” to seeing and meeting with families was very, very hard. We watched the distress and isolation around us and we could do nothing to help. That experience has greatly shaped our business since the world opened up again – there have been changes to streamline the arranging of funerals with introduction of medical examiners, digital documents are pretty much the default and clients arranging everything remotely if they wish. We, as a profession, have also seen a considerable rise in unattended cremations - we have always done direct cremations, just under another name, and although there is definitely a need for these types of funerals I worry that some loved ones that are left behind don’t get the closure or fully process their loss without the “goodbye” of some sort of service. That is where we can help talk through all the options and make sure that our clients receive all the information they need to make an informed and personal choice that is right for them.
Andrew, my cousin and co-director, and I run the company together however we are like chalk and cheese – the same as our fathers who ran the company before us. This brings an overall balance to our company and means jointly we have eyes on pretty much everything. That being said in recent years we have developed the art of delegation and this has brought about a fresh, exciting and dynamic team of people who excel in their roles and together we are achieving some amazing results: modernising, becoming more efficient and much more outward looking. I am beyond proud of what we do – we are all just ordinary people doing an extraordinary job.
