How to make a farewell video for a coworker

To make a farewell video for a coworker, pick one organizer, collect a short message from each person on one shared link, set a deadline a few days before their last day, and play it at the send-off or send it to arrive at a set time. The whole thing takes about two weeks and maybe an hour of actual work, most of it spent chasing the last five people.

1. Decide who's organizing

One person runs it. Two can work if they split the jobs clearly, but a committee means nobody sends the reminder. If you're the one reading this, it's probably you.

Tell your coworker's manager early. They can keep your coworker out of the way when needed, confirm the real last day, and make sure the send-off is on the calendar.

2. Make the list

Start with the obvious group, then widen it:

• Their current team
• People in other departments they work with every week (the IT person they're always texting, the account manager down the hall)
• Former teammates who moved to other roles or other offices
• Their first manager at the company, if that person is still around
• One or two clients, if the relationship is friendly and it fits your workplace

Then ask the one person who knows your coworker best to read the list and add who's missing. There's always someone, usually the person they have lunch with every Friday.

For most people, 15 to 30 messages is plenty. You don't need the whole company. A video of 40 people who barely know them is worse than 12 who do.

3. Reach remote coworkers and people who already left

Remote coworkers are easy: they record from their desk like everyone else. Just make sure they get the invite directly, not through a meeting they might skip.

People who already left take a little more work. Find them on LinkedIn, or ask whoever stayed in touch for a personal email. Keep the ask short: "Sam's last day at Hartwell is the 14th. We're collecting short video messages. Would you add one? It takes about a minute." Former coworkers say yes more often than you'd expect, and nobody sees their messages coming.

4. Keep it a surprise

Most surprises get ruined in the group chat. A few ways to avoid that:

• Don't post in any channel your coworker is in. Make a separate channel or thread without them, and double-check the member list.
• Use email for people outside the team, and ask everyone not to reply-all.
• Tell people to record at home or in an empty meeting room, not at their desk next to your coworker.
• If you're asking their closest work friend to help, remind them that "you'll see" is a spoiler.

Get everyone's messages into one video

Share one link, everyone records a short message from their phone or computer, and at the time you choose it all plays as one video.

Build a moment

5. Set a deadline

Give people about a week to ten days, and set the deadline two or three days before the last day. That leaves time for stragglers and for putting the video together.

Write the deadline with a day and a time: "by Wednesday at noon," not "by next week." People treat a vague deadline as a suggestion.

6. Send invites and remind only the people who are missing

Email works best at work, because you can give each person their own link and track who's done it. When you post one link in a group chat, you can't tell who's ignoring it.

About three days before the deadline, check who hasn't added a message and remind just those people, one tap or one short email each. Don't send a reminder to all 25 people when 18 of them already did it. It annoys the ones who were on time, and the ones who weren't will scroll past it anyway.

On the morning of the deadline, send one last reminder to whoever is still missing. After that, let it go. A few gaps are normal.

7. Put the messages in order

The order changes how the video feels. What usually works:

• Open with someone warm and short, often a close teammate. Not the CEO. Opening with the most senior person makes the whole thing feel like an all-hands.
• In the middle, alternate the funny ones with the sincere ones, and don't put three people from the same team back to back.
• Close with their manager or the one coworker they're closest to. The last message is the one people talk about afterward.

Trim the second at the start where people check whether it's recording, and the bit at the end where they reach for the stop button. Leave everything they actually say alone.

8. Decide how they'll watch it

You have two good options.

Play it at the send-off

Play it from a laptop hooked up to the conference room screen, or share your screen on the video call if the team is remote. Test the sound in that room beforehand, because conference room speakers are a gamble. Keep an eye on the length: 20 messages at 45 seconds each is 15 minutes, which is about the limit for a room full of people standing up with cake.

Send it to arrive at a set time

For example, 5 p.m. on their last day, or 9 a.m. on their first morning off. They watch at home, at their own pace, without thirty coworkers watching them watch it. This works well for private people, for remote teams across time zones and for anyone who'd rather not tear up in front of the sales department.

You can also do both: play a few messages at the send-off and send the whole thing that evening.

What people can say

Most people freeze at "record a message," so put a short prompt in the invite: 30 to 60 seconds, one specific memory, and one thing you'll miss or one wish for what's next.

A few examples to share with the group:

• "Sam, you're the only person who ever read the whole onboarding doc, and you fixed three typos in it on day one. I'm going to miss that level of attention. Good luck at the new place."
• "Thank you for covering my shift the week my car died. I owe you a lot of coffee, and I intend to pay."
• "The Friday trivia team is officially down its only member who knew geography. We're going to lose every week, and it's your fault."

For more lines, see what to write when a coworker leaves.

Making it at work

To see how it works with a group of coworkers, go to our page for teams at work. For the collecting part in more detail, read how to collect video messages from a group.

Build a moment