So I finally learned how to use Slack in a way that stops giving me the @.@ feeling

Summary

Lucy Dan shares her recent discovery of Slack features that have significantly improved her experience with the platform, especially in managing multiple projects and staying updated with her favorite writers in the Writers and Editors of Colour (WEOC) community.

Abstract

The author, Lucy Dan, confesses that despite using Slack for a long time, she only recently learned how to effectively manage the platform to reduce overwhelm from numerous channels and to keep up with her favorite writers' articles in WEOC. She details her past frustration with Slack's inability to track her read messages, particularly in a channel where articles are shared. Dan explains that she used to rely on Slack's "Threads" feature and even trained new Research Assistants (RAs) to use it, but found it insufficient when others replied in-channel with mentions. Her breakthrough came when she discovered that Slack could be customized to list all unread messages, including new threads and responses, in a single space. This change has made her Slack experience more manageable and efficient. Dan invites readers to share their own Slack tips to help her and others avoid unnecessary suffering.

Opinions

Lucy Dan admits to feeling embarrassed about her late realization that she could "clap" more than once on Medium, drawing a parallel to her recent Slack discovery.
She finds Slack's algorithmic behavior, which mimics other platforms by requiring user interaction to prioritize content, to be inconvenient.
Dan is critical of the common approach to self-improvement content, which often uses strong imperatives and shame, preferring a more casual and realistic tone in her own writing.
She expresses excitement about finding a solution within Slack that suits her needs as a senior student and writer, emphasizing the importance of being able to track conversations and updates effectively.
Despite her seniority in her research lab, Dan acknowledges that she cannot always control how others use Slack, highlighting the need for a versatile solution.
She is grateful for the sense of community and shared knowledge within WEOC, which has helped her discover content that the algorithm typically buries.
Dan values the complexity and messiness of life and aims to reflect this in her writing, which ranges from life hacks to poetry.

Maybe I’m late on this but maybe I’m not, so I’m sharing it just in case :’)

Remember how it was something embarrassing like four months into using Medium that I realized you could “clap” more than once? Here’s the evidence of my Dumb (tm):

I was reading an article that had a fantastic introduction that seemed to signal that things were going in one direction. I clapped early, already enjoying their writing style and points. This was a mistake.

Well, I’ve been using Slack for even longer for a number of different reasons and I’ve always been frustrated with it. I’ve been using it with my research lab for the longest, and it’s been useful to help separate project collaborations by channel, but as I became more of a senior student with 1298376123817263 (read: 2+) projects, it started becoming overwhelming to manage the different channels and make sure I read all the messages and threads.

Plus, when I finally joined WEOC (Writers and Editors of Colour), I was so excited to find that there’s a channel in which everyone shares their articles. The algorithm almost consistently buries pieces from my favourite writers, even when I bookmark and manually go back to their pieces over and over again, so having a channel where I can just go down everyone’s responses and make sure I’m caught up has been so much easier for me.

Well, with every single platform where there is an algorithm generating feed content, I consciously “feed” content to my algorithm from time to time. For example, I specifically search certain hashtags (or tags) or scroll through and interact with specific types of accounts on a more regular basis.

For some absurdly funny and inconvenient reason, this channel always sends me back to mid-March no matter how long I spend sitting in that channel, what I type into the channel, or what I’ve reacted/ responded to in the channel.

For some reason, I just couldn’t get Slack to recognize that I’d “read” and am now updated on the channel.

Today, in total procrastination (and celebration that I finished grading assignments for the semester, phew!), I was poking around a few of my Slack workspaces, trying to fix this.

I’ve been using the “Threads” feature located in the top left of each Slack workspace to keep track of embedded conversations. I find that this has been insufficient because while some folks like to use the thread feature, others reply in-channel using mentions, which makes tracking conversations difficult.

In my lab, given my seniority, I may have just trained all new RAs to use the threads rather than tagging. However, that’s not always possible when you’re in more of a participant role than a management role within a Slack workspace.

I didn’t realize that you could customize your slack workspace so that all unreads can also be listed in one single space.

screenshot by author

Doing so lets me see all new updates, including new threads, responses, mentions, that I haven’t read. For me, this has been far more useful than mentions-only and thread-only features.

What are your tips for using Slack?

Please share them below so I can stop Suffering™.

Hi I’m Lucy Dan 蛋小姐 (she/her/她) and I write about whatever my heart desires — that’s my commitment to myself as a writer. Sometimes that looks like life hacks written in a more casual tone (Unsure about you but I’ve read 1010101 self-improvement pieces that are written with strong imperatives and shame as “empowerment” and it’s tiring. I want someone to write self-improvement from the point of view of how messy and complex life truly is.) Sometimes it’s in the form of dumb poems. Who knows what adventure today will bring you, right?

Hop down the rabbit hole? 🐰🕳

So I finally learned how to use Slack in a way that stops giving me the @.@ feeling

Maybe I’m late on this but maybe I’m not, so I’m sharing it just in case :’)

The Story of How I Learned You Could Clap More Than Once

A story of instant regret 🚨

Stories of fighting with the algorithm and confusions over the new updates

and I was very confused for a LONG time 😅

hidden delights

poetry prompts: what are some things you’ve encountered by happenstance that have serendipitously brought you joy?

The Ineffective Force of Chaos

A poem