Salesforce Transforms Slack into Project Management Platform with New Slack Lists Feature
Salesforce Inc. has introduced Slack Lists, a new feature designed to transform Slack from a simple collaboration tool into a comprehensive project management platform. Initially rolling out in select regions, Slack Lists will soon be available to all paid Slack users, integrating project and task management directly into the Slack interface. Salesforce Announces Slack Lists for Project Management.
And this answers the age old question, can Salesforce be used as a project management tool?
Key Benefits and Features
- Unified Platform: One of the primary advantages of Slack Lists is reducing the need for workers to switch between different platforms. A Salesforce study highlighted that only 34% of enterprise projects are completed on time and within budget, partly because employees often discuss tasks outside their primary project management tools. This creates silos and disorganization, leading to miscommunications and delays.
- Enhanced Collaboration: Slack Lists allows entire projects to be organized, managed, and discussed within Slack, enhancing collaboration and ensuring alignment on various projects, requests, approvals, and more. It provides tools for prioritizing deliverables, advancing work stages, and improving accountability.
- Flexibility: The feature is highly adaptable, supporting a wide range of projects, from new product releases and marketing campaigns to employee onboarding processes.
Collaborative Tools
Slack Lists excels in fostering collaboration by allowing team members to bring relevant coworkers into conversations and create message threads for specific list items. These threads consolidate discussions about particular items, requests, or issues into single, organized conversations. This ensures tasks are not forgotten and keeps all team members informed about project progress.
- Automation and Efficiency: Users can automate and manage requests and to-do lists within Slack, enhancing workflow efficiency. For instance, teams can use Slack’s no-code automation tool, Workflow Builder, to automate routine tasks. Additionally, Slack’s integrated generative AI capabilities enable advanced search and summarization of threads, making Slack Lists a centralized hub for managing work.
Executive Insights
Denise Dresser, CEO of Slack, stated that Slack Lists transforms conversations into actionable tasks that drive work forward. “Now those loose steps shared in a project channel can be tracked across teams,” she explained. “With project management in Slack, teams across organizations will have everything they need to complete projects faster and increase productivity.”
Practical Applications
Salesforce emphasized that Slack Lists can benefit any organization within an enterprise. For example:
- Sales Teams: Can better align themselves across individual team accounts to close deals faster by mapping out account strategies, preparing for customer meetings, and managing request approvals.
- Service Teams: Can resolve incidents faster by standardizing processes, pulling in relevant experts to handle issues, and using templates to guide agents.
- Marketing Teams: Can plan and execute new campaigns entirely within Slack.
Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. noted that Salesforce has long aimed to extend Slack’s capabilities beyond core messaging and collaboration. “Salesforce has opted to go generic with Slack Lists, allowing users to create list entries for projects, service requests, and more,” he said. “This ideally makes collaboration on those projects easier, making Slack more goal-oriented and changing the future of work.”
Early Adoption
Marriott International Inc. participated in the pilot phase of Slack Lists before its general release. Lori Drake, Director of System Strategy at Marriott Digital Services, expressed enthusiasm about the feature, saying, “We’re excited to use lists to manage projects and track requests, and think it can unlock significant time savings for our teams.”
Availability
- Slack Lists: Available now in select regions and will soon be accessible to all paid Slack users.
- Unified Conversations for WhatsApp: Generally available now.
- Omni-Channel on Mobile: Beta release in summer 2024, with general availability for all Digital Engagement channels later in 2024.
- Bring Your Own Channel: Generally available in summer 2024.
- LINE Support: Generally available later in 2024.
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