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Slack is one of the best online collaboration tools, streamlining communication for remote teams. However, despite the platform’s simplicity, it’s never easy managing a large team – or one that’s actively growing, continually adding more workspaces, channels, and chats. Luckily, though, Slack has introduced a host of new AI-powered innovations, including native ChatGPT integration.
ChatGPT in Slack can help you draft posts, replies, and updates in virtually no time at all and without having to leave the app. It can also summarize long conversation threads into clear, scannable notes with actionable takeaways.
The AI chatbot can also dig into Slack conversations and generate structured weekly reports, complete with project status, key milestones, and an action plan for the future. In this article, we’ll learn how to use ChatGPT in Slack to cut down clutter and draft weekly reports from everyday team conversations.
Connecting ChatGPT to Slack
First, you’ll need to connect ChatGPT to your Slack account. It’s available as a third-party integration with all Slack plans. Here’s how to connect the two:
Step 1: Open the Slack app or its web browser version and click the workspace where you want to add ChatGPT.
Step 2: Click the three-dot icon on the left panel of your Slack interface and select Tools, then Apps.
Step 3: Search for ChatGPT in the search bar of the window that pops open and click Install.
Step 4: A new window will open with information about ChatGPT in Slack. Click the Add to Slack button on the left panel.
Step 5: You’ll be redirected to a blog post from ChatGPT about how to install the app for Slack. Scroll down to the Installation section to find the installation link – or you can click this link.
Step 6: You’ll now see the Add ChatGPT to Slack modal, where you can review the provided information. Next, click Continue to Slack.
Step 7: You’ll now see the Slack authentication flow, where you can check and grant app permissions. Click Allow to continue.
Step 8: Return to your Slack workspace. You’ll find ChatGPT in the Apps section. Before you can get cracking with the app, though, you’ll need to connect Slack to your ChatGPT account.
Click the Connect ChatGPT button you see in the chat. Following this, you’ll be redirected to ChatGPT on your browser, where you’ll need to log in if you haven’t already.
The Connect ChatGPT button will disappear from the Slack chat, and you can now use the AI to streamline your in-app conversations.
Adding ChatGPT to a channel
So far, we’ve only added ChatGPT to a workspace, which allows you to chat with the AI assistant within Slack. However, to summarize an entire conversation thread, you’ll have to copy-paste the entire content in a separate ChatGPT conversation.
Of course, this is a lot of legwork, but you can bypass it by inviting ChatGPT to the channels – so it can access the conversations first-hand and generate the necessary reports and insights. Here’s how to do it:
Step 1: Open the Slack channel you want to invite ChatGPT to and type /invite in the message box. Next, click the Add apps to this channel option that pops up.
Step 2: From the list of apps that pops up, press the Add button next to ChatGPT.
You’ve now successfully added ChatGPT to your Slack channel. And yes, you can add the AI assistant to multiple channels within the same workspace.
How to use ChatGPT to generate weekly status reports in Slack
It’s finally time to learn how to use ChatGPT to organize your Slack workflow.
Visit the channel you want to analyze and type the following prompt: “@ChatGPT, summarize the channel’s activity from the past 7 days into a weekly status report.”
Because ChatGPT is a member of the channel, it can access all of the conversations required to build the report. It puts in the work and quickly renders a weekly summary of all key discussions.
While this single prompt is enough to get a quick snapshot of your week, you can further engineer the prompt to make it more precise for better results.
For example, you can set rules such as:
- Ignore casual talk, reactions, and emojis
- Focus only on work-related discussions
- Preserve ownership (who did what work)
This will ensure ChatGPT doesn’t infest the report with casual conversations or miss out on important project ownership details.
Additionally, you can add a specific format template for ChatGPT to follow, so the outputs are more structured. An example for this could be:
“@ChatGPT, make sure to follow this format while designing the weekly report:
- Overall Summary (4-5 lines)
- Key milestones this week
- Pending targets and reasons
- Priorities for the next week”
This comes in handy if you’re working on management-facing reports that require a more professional tone. Plus, following a template ensures consistency across different weekly reports, making them easy to review and compare.
The best part? All of this takes only a couple of minutes, so you don’t have to worry about running it manually at the end of every week. Oh, and don’t forget to publish the results in your Slack channels.
Setting up a Stack workflow
If you have the Pro Slack plan (or higher), you can also choose to fully automate the weekly reporting feature by setting up a workflow. This eliminates the need for manual prompts, meaning ChatGPT will automatically render weekly reports every Friday (or on a day and time of your choosing). Here’s a step-by-step breakdown of how to set it up:
Step 1: Open your Slack workspace and click Tools > Workflows. Tap the New button in the top-right corner and choose Build Workflow to create a custom workflow.
Step 2: Rename your workflow by pressing Untitled Workflow at the top of your screen. In this case, we’ve named it Weekly Status Report.
Step 3: Click Choose an event to start building your automation. A new window with pre-suggested actions will open. Select On a schedule.
Step 4: Enter the time you want to run this automation. For this example, we want to get weekly reports every Friday at 16:00. Make sure to choose the appropriate time zone and frequency. Once this is done, click Continue.
Step 5: Click Add Steps and choose Send a message to a channel.
Step 6: Select the channel you want to send this message to. For simplicity, we’ve created a separate #weekly-updates channel for this.
Step 7: Enter the prompt. Make sure you reference the right channel here. We want to summarize the conversations in the main channel and send the summary to our #weekly-updates channel. So, you could start your prompt like this: “@ChatGPT, summarize the activity in #main-channel from the last 5 days and generate a weekly report.” Click Save when done.
Step 8: Select Finish Up in the top-right corner of your main workflow interface. In the confirmation window that opens, edit your workflow name and then hit Publish.
Simply put, this automation will automatically send a message to your main channel, asking ChatGPT to summarize the week in the form of a report and then send the result to the #weekly-updates channel.
Things to keep in mind while using ChatGPT in Slack
Here are a few things to keep in mind before you integrate ChatGPT with your Slack:
Paid subscriptions
While the free Slack plan allows you to integrate up to 10 third-party apps, you’ll need a paid plan to actually deploy and use these apps within Slack’s infrastructure. This means while you can connect ChatGPT with Slack on the free plan, you won’t be able to use it unless you upgrade. Slack’s paid subscriptions start at $3.26/user/month, billed annually.
Similarly, you’ll need a premium ChatGPT plan, which starts at $20/month, since Slack integration and automations are only supported on the paid plans.
Don’t aim for perfection right away
While it’s important to define exactly what you want ChatGPT to do with your Slack conversations, don’t overwhelm the AI with complicated prompts from the get-go.
You can start with a simple prompt like “Summarize the conversation from the last 7 days” and then add more nuances to fine-tune the results. Complex prompts can confuse the AI assistant, leading to ignored instructions or inaccurate results.
Workspace limitations
Slack allows you to integrate ChatGPT with only one workspace at a time. This means if you want weekly reports for different workspaces, you’ll need to disconnect ChatGPT from one workspace before reconnecting it to another.