The pros and cons of utilizing Slack
Fully understanding Slack's pros and cons will allow you to make an easier decision over the best way to communicate your intended message. Slack has been built to make working both easier and smoother for your whole team; however, there are some elements that you might want to consider when looking into the platform.
The pros of Slack
Here is a list of some of the pros of using Slack:
- User interface (UI): Slack is continuously raved about for its user-friendly design. The onboarding process is simple for getting all of your team members onto the platform on their first day with the company. Additionally, the clear directions given on the platform for sending messages, finding documents, and searching for them make it simple for daily use. Other pros, along with those already mentioned, include the following:
a. A beautiful user experience (UX) and UI
b. Clear channel and message designations
c. Intuitive for first-time users
- Quick connections: Group and individual messaging functions are as simple as writing a message and clicking on Send. There is no longer a need to triple-check recipients who are BCC'd in, nor question the best method for quickly pinging a large group. One of Slack's most significant pros is its quick and efficient messaging to maintain communication across your company. Other advantages in this category include the following:
a. Notifications for new messages
b. Easy-to-create group messaging
c. In-platform calls
d. Ability to add external parties to a channel
e. Transparency across the team
- Search: Slack's ability to save and archive all threads of conversation that occur on the platform is game-changing for many companies. Slack eliminates the fear of losing any information shared with another team member or accidentally throwing away a meeting communication with an important to-do list. Housing these items, and many more, on Slack means that everything is stored for you to find at a moment's notice. Other pros, along with those already mentioned, include the following:
a. A detailed history of communications
b. Time and date details per message
c. Stored files shared on the platform
d. A filtering system when searching for a specific item
- Integration: A final significant and attractive part of Slack is its ability to integrate with other tools, apps, and bots to streamline your work even more. This is an important topic for later in this book where we teach you how to build bots for Slack integration. Here are the pros of Slack's integration function:
a. Dozens of Slack apps are available to integrate.
b. You have the ability to develop your own tool.
Let's move on to the cons of Slack next.
The cons of Slack
Slack is an incredibly powerful platform to bring into your team's toolbox. However, there are a few elements where Slack falls short of in its development. They include the following:
Overwhelming: Many individuals are drawn to Slack for ease of communication and a social-like feel, yet this can easily be a con for many people. The line between work life and home life can start to blur when a message ping comes through, and you are compelled to respond. Other disadvantages in this space include the following:
- It is easy to respond during out-of-office hours when it feels like a "chat" rather than work.
- Notifications can become overwhelming.
- Messages can become unorganized quickly.
- Context switching occurs easily.
Disorganization: Communications move so quickly on Slack that individuals can sometimes feel lost by the rapid pace. The platform also loses out on a number of customization features that could make the disorganization and faster pace easier to handle. Cons in this area include the following:
- Fast-paced communications can be hard to keep track of.
- There is no automated messaging (without the need for a bot or an app).
- There is limited customization.
- Screen sharing is not accessible via iOS or Android
- The Free plan has a minimal number of features.
Though, like any platform, there are aspects of Slack that do not quite meet every team member's satisfaction, Slack has overwhelmingly proved to be a positive tool in the workplace. In comparison to its competitors, Slack provides a scale, from beginner start-ups to big-name corporations, that allows for a wide range of growth that other applications simply can't compete with.