Slack Tips 

Overview

Here is a video Christina made as an overview of Slack: 


Setup

Here is a link to a video tutorial, made by Christina, which shows you how to setup your profile and customize your preferences in Slack:

Using Emoticons

Emoticons can be useful in Slack.  Use a thumbs up to acknowledge that you read a post or you agree with what someone is saying rather than actually replying to the post.  You can also use emotions for polling a group.  Post a yes/no question and have people respond with the thumbs up or green check for "yes" or the thumbs down or red X for "no".  In the screenshot below, I posted three time slots and asked people to use the emotions to indicate which slots they were available.  The emotions are tallied (by number), but if I click on the number, it will give me a list of the people who responded.


Send emails directly to Slack

You can send emails to a slack channel.
Go into the Slack channel and click on the "i" on the top right
Another screen appears, click the three dots (More)
A menu opens, select Send Emails to channel
A new window opens, click "Copy" and the email address for that slack channel will be in your copy/paste buffer (close the window)
Open a new email and in the "To:" area paste in the address (cntrl-V or right click "paste") - once you send the email it will appear in the Slack channel 

Organize your Channels

You can organize your channels into sections to make it easier to find the ones you need.
Hoover over the CHANNELS heading and click the three dots (on right)
Choose CREATE NEW SECTION
Enter a name for your section and click CREATE
Once you create your section, right click on a channel and select MOVE CHANNEL and then select the section you want to put it in
If you want to remove a channel from a section, right click the channel and select MOVE CHANNEL and you'll see an option for REMOVE FROM 

Set Reminders

OPTION 1: (setup a general reminder)
  • Click the lightning bolt in the lower left corner of the area where you type a post
  • Select Set Yourself a Reminder
  • Enter the info and click Create
OPTION 2: (remind you about a specific post)
  • Select the three dots to the right of a particular post
  • Select Remind Me About This
  • Choose the time you want to be reminded

Mentions

Mentions are a direct way to notify people of something that needs their attention in Slack. Use the "@" sign in front of a person's name.  Doing this will send a notification to that person.
Example: @Christina DeCesare Len do you know the password to the guest account?
This will send a notification to Christina but also allow the others in the channel to see the information when Christina responds.
@here will send a notification to anyone who is ACTIVE in a channel for times when you need information immediately.
You can find more information on mentions here:

Keyboard Shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts can improve productivity by saving time.  To see a list of keyboard shortcuts in Slack, hold the ctrl key and hit the "/"  key.  The list of shortcuts will show up on the right.

Regulate Notifications by Channel

You can set the notification of each channel separately by right clicking the channel name and choosing "change notifications".  This helps to set notifications for important channels and mute notifications for non-essential ones.