Someone at work has died. Now you've been asked — or you've volunteered — to give a eulogy at the service. Maybe you were their manager. Maybe you sat next to them for ten years. Maybe you're the only person from the team who could get to the funeral. Whatever the reason, you're here, looking at a blank page.
This guide walks you through how to write a eulogy for your colleague from blank page to delivered tribute. A workplace eulogy is a specific thing. You're not family. You're not a childhood friend. You knew them in a particular context — and that context is exactly what the family wants to hear about.
Step 1: Understand What the Family Actually Wants
Before you write anything, think about who will be in the audience and what they're hoping you'll give them.
The family didn't watch your colleague run the Monday stand-up. They didn't see how they handled the impossible client. They don't know about the time your team stayed until 2 a.m. to ship the launch and your colleague kept everyone laughing. That version of their loved one is invisible to them — and it is exactly what you can offer.
So the brief is simple: show them a version of their loved one they didn't get to see. Be specific. Be human. Skip the corporate tribute language. Nobody wants to hear that your colleague "brought value to the organization."
Step 2: Brain Dump Everything You Remember
You can't edit a blank page. Before you try to write anything finished, get raw material on paper.
Set a timer for fifteen minutes. Write down everything you remember about your colleague without stopping. Things they said in meetings. Their coffee order. What their desk looked like. The joke they made every Monday morning. Their signature move in a negotiation. How they treated interns. The time you disagreed with them and they won you over. What it felt like when they walked into a room.
Don't organize. Don't edit. You're fishing for the two or three details that will carry the whole eulogy, and you have to dredge up the rest to find them.
Step 3: Pick Your Angle
Every good eulogy has one angle — a single thread that runs through it. When you're figuring out how to write a eulogy for your colleague, the angle is usually one of these:
- The professional identity. The thing they were known for at work. The team they built. The problem they solved. The standard they set.
- The human moments inside the work. Not what they did — how they did it. The way they welcomed new hires. The way they delivered hard feedback. The way they celebrated other people's wins.
- The friendship that grew out of work. You started as coworkers. It became something more than that. Tell that story.
- The mentor angle. They taught you how to do your job, or how to handle your career, or how to be a professional at all. Now you pass that forward.
Pick one. A colleague eulogy under five minutes has room for one clear thread, not four.
Step 4: Choose Two Stories With Specific Details
Adjectives get forgotten. Stories get remembered. If you say your colleague was generous, the room nods and moves on. If you tell the story of the time they spent their Saturday helping a new hire debug code before a Monday demo, the room sees them.
Look at your brain dump and circle two stories that meet these tests:
- They show who your colleague actually was
- They have a specific detail — a date, a room, a line of dialogue
- You can tell them in under two minutes
- They're appropriate for the family to hear
"Dan sat next to me for six years. Every morning at 9:15 he would roll his chair over to my desk, drop a sticky note on my keyboard with the day's most ridiculous news headline, and roll back without saying a word. I still have a stack of them in a drawer. He did this for every new person on the team. It was his welcome. It was also, I realized after a while, his way of saying: this job is serious, but we are not going to pretend it's the only thing that matters. I kept every note. I'm going to frame a few of them."
Notice what's doing the work there. A specific ritual. A specific object. A small behavior that reveals a whole character. And a final sentence that tells the family what it meant.
Step 5: Draft It in One Sitting
Once you have your angle and your stories, sit down and write the full draft without stopping. Don't edit as you go. Don't re-read. Just push through.
A colleague eulogy usually has four parts:
- An opening that establishes who you are and how you knew them. ("I worked with Anna for eleven years at Martinez & Lee. I was her deputy for the last five.")
- A setup that introduces your angle. ("Most of what I'm going to say is about Anna at work — because that's where I knew her. What I hope you'll hear is how much of her was present in that room every day.")
- Two stories that show your angle in action.
- A short closing that hands something to the family.
Aim for 400 to 600 words. A colleague eulogy is almost always shorter than a family one. Don't fight that.
Step 6: Address the Family Directly
Here's a move that works almost every time: somewhere in the middle or end of your eulogy, turn and speak directly to the family. Just for a sentence or two.
"To Maria, and to the kids — I want you to know something. In eleven years, I never heard your husband say 'I have to get home.' I heard him say 'I get to go home.' Every time. That's a distinction your family made possible, and you deserve to know that."
That's a sentence the family will remember for the rest of their lives. It costs you almost nothing to write. It belongs in every colleague eulogy.
Step 7: Avoid the Three Big Workplace Eulogy Traps
A few mistakes that turn workplace eulogies into cringey ones.
The LinkedIn profile. Do not list their job titles chronologically. Nobody cares that they were "Senior Director of Operations from 2018 to 2022." Their family watched them live that. You don't need to repeat it at a funeral.
Inside jokes that need context. A ten-minute setup for a one-line payoff will not land in a room full of grieving strangers. If a story requires the listener to understand your company's internal politics, cut it.
Complaints about the company, even lightly. This is not the venue for commentary on layoffs, management, or the broken printer. Leave work grievances at work.
Step 8: Read It Out Loud
Reading on a page and speaking at a microphone are two different physical acts. Read your eulogy out loud at least three times before the service.
- Once for flow. If a sentence trips you, rewrite it.
- Once for length. Time it. Four to five minutes is the sweet spot.
- Once for the emotional beats. Mark any line that makes you catch. You don't have to cut them, but you need to know where they are so you can breathe before them.
If you're unsure whether a story is appropriate, send it to one other colleague who knew them. A second set of eyes will catch anything that sounds fine in your head but wrong at a funeral.
Step 9: Deliver It With Composure
The day of the service, bring:
- A printed copy in 14-point font, double-spaced
- A pen
- Water at the podium
- A handkerchief
Do not read from your phone. Phones lock. Notifications appear. Paper is steady. Before you stand up, take three slow breaths. When you reach the microphone, put your hands on the podium. Speak to the back of the room. Speak slower than feels natural — you will still sound faster than you think.
You are not performing. You are representing every colleague who couldn't be there, or couldn't bring themselves to speak. Keep it honest, keep it short, and keep it pointed at the family.
Sample Opening for a Colleague Eulogy
Here's what a finished opening passage might sound like. Adapt it to your own voice and relationship.
"Thank you for letting me be part of this today. My name is Priya — I worked with Kevin for the last eight years at Arden Consulting. We met on his first day, which was also my first week as a manager, and I think we were both equally unsure of what we were doing. He was the first person I ever hired. He ended up being the person I learned the most from.
I won't try to cover Kevin's whole life — that's not my place, and his family will do it better. I want to tell you about the Kevin we knew at work, because that version of him deserves to be in this room too."
Short. Honest. Names the relationship. Sets the boundary of what you're going to cover. Promises the family a specific view. That's the whole job of an opening.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long should a eulogy for a colleague be?
Three to five minutes, or roughly 400 to 600 words. A colleague eulogy is usually shorter than a family one. The family will speak first and longer. Your job is to add the workplace dimension, not to cover the whole life.
Should I focus on their work or their personality?
Both, but start with the person. Lead with one or two human traits — their humor, their kindness, their stubbornness — and let the work stories illustrate those traits. A eulogy that reads like a résumé won't move anyone.
What if I didn't know them well outside of work?
That's fine. Speak only from where you actually stood. You don't need to pretend you were best friends. A workplace-specific eulogy, told honestly, is often exactly what the family needs to hear. They want to know who their loved one was at work.
Is it appropriate to tell funny work stories?
Yes, if the humor fits who they were and is safe for the room. Inside jokes that require ten minutes of context won't land. A short, clean story about something funny they said in a meeting usually will. Run it past another colleague first if you're unsure.
Related Reading
If you'd like more help, these may be useful:
Ready to Write Your Eulogy?
If the service is close and you're still stuck at the blank page, you don't have to do this alone. Our team at Eulogy Expert can help you shape your memories of your colleague into a tribute that honors both the professional and the person. Answer a few questions about who they were, what they were like at work, and the stories you want told — and we'll draft something personal that you can edit and deliver.
You can start here: eulogyexpert.com/form. Losing a colleague shakes a workplace in ways that are easy to underestimate. If the blank page is in your way, we can help you move past it.