YP Spotlight the most rewarding part of the job. It was the friendships formed through my work and the peace I gained each time I would be able to seemingly lessen the pain and burden of those left behind by serving them to the best of my abilities. Apart from this, I think that it’s also been very rewarding to be given the trust and opportunity to take on a lot of new projects that help the company continue to grow and innovate. I truly appreciate the freedom and leeway I’m given to explore how the old can meet the new. What are your professional goals? Ultimately, it’s my dream to see the company expand. I’ve personally seen how Arlington’s brand of service has managed to leave a positive and lasting impact on its client-families. It would be great to see this level of service be offered to more of our fellow Filipinos. I also graduated from a tech-management course, which encourages me to see how I can further our business with the upwards trend of e-commerce. What are you proud of that you have achieved so far during your career in funeral service? While I haven’t been working for the company for long, I joined at a time where the industry was immensely affected during the first few weeks of the pandemic—I was overwhelmed with the number of cases that were coming in on a daily basis. One of the things that pained me the most as a death-care practitioner was seeing how families were not given any closure in the occurrence of a death. All families had were body bags and identification tags. There were no ceremonies, tributes and the like – all of which I felt were integral to the grieving process. I saw how difficult and painful it was for a grieving family to not be able to say goodbye to their loved one properly. My frustration over the situation fueled a desire to find ways to provide comfort during such an uncertain and anxiety-filled time in their lives. I decided to launch Arlington’s first ever umbrella of digital services. These services included online tribute pages, curated Spotify playlists that included the favorite music and artists of their loved one, Zoom links good for nine days where family and 16 www.ogr.org | Summer 2020 Bettina with her father Raffy Jose, the president and CEO of Arlington Memorial Chapels. friends could come together to pray, share their stories and find comfort in their support systems, albeit only virtually, without having to worry about a time limit. I was particularly proud of this because I saw how it offered a measure of comfort to the family members who never got the last hug and the last goodbye that everybody deserves. What are some important/notable trends that you have noticed in funeral service? We’ve seen a clear spike in families opting for cremation, most especially when COVID-19 hit. I’ve also seen that as the decision makers become younger and younger, it’s become imperative to begin catering to their manner of doing business. This includes considering their preference for the use of technology to make the process more expedient/convenient.
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