Internal Communications Resources: Slack Norms and Guidelines

Team/Department Expectations

• Department heads should communicate with their teams about usage expectations for Slack
• Cross-departmental teams should discuss their primary communication modes at least once

Shared responsibility

• Participants in Slack threads share responsibility for ensuring that Slack threads are useful, timely, respectful, and inclusive, and should move threads to other communication methods as needed.

Slack usage expectations

• Understand that not everyone’s working hours align with your own. Consider scheduled sends if you’re reaching out outside of typical work hours.
• Make sure you follow your department expectation for having Slack open or have the conversation with your manager if expectations are not clear. Managers should make expectations clear to new staff during onboarding.
• Slack is not a universal substitute for email or meetings.

Update/Add a status (for example, “working remotely,” “on vacation,” etc.) to allow others to view your general location/status each day  

• Please note: the FlexWork norms designate the Outlook calendar as the primary method to use for sharing work status information.
• Slack’s active/inactive indicators show a status based on whether users have read or sent messages in the past 10 minutes

Slack should be checked at least once a day

• In order to keep conversation moving, it is best to check Slack and respond to direct messages at least once a day. 
• Consider creating custom notifications if you do not regularly open Slack

• Refer to Slack’s New User Guide for an introduction to Slack.
• Use the first and last name that you go by in the “Full Name” section of your Profile; the “Display Name” is your Kerberos user name as the default.
  • You can also add your job title, your pronouns and your name pronunciation.
  • Users can integrate Slack with their Outlook calendar to help keep their status up to date (e.g. working remotely, in a meeting, out sick, on campus, on vacation)
• Optional settings include: adding profile photos, an office phone number, and downloading the Slack application on personal devices
  • It is not expected that staff will use their personal devices for work needs and they are not expected to check their messages outside of their scheduled work hours.

• Ask quick or general questions
• Share links or brief updates
  • Please note Slack channels have a 90-day retention policy. Links that people may need to refer to later should be shared via email or on a project management tool.
• Do quick group brainstorming
• Have periodic virtual “standup” meetings to share progress, planned work or blockers
• Humanize the workplace by providing opportunities for informal interactions across work locations
• Share quick and timely “I’m running late”-type of messages

• Conduct lengthy or detailed communications 
  • Route detailed communications to email, a ticketing system, a collaborative document-editing tool or through a meeting.
• Have emotionally charged conversations or discussing performance issues
  • These are better left for face-to-face interactions
  • See the Email Norms “Email vs. in-person Communications” for more guidelines
• Create tickets for support requests or user reference questions
  • For staff technology support use the DLS Service Portal (JSM)
  • Refer to PSDocs for information on how to help a patron
• Manage to-do lists, delegate tasks, or to manage a workflow or project 
  • Try tasks management tools such as Trello, Asana or JIRA instead
• Store and organize files/data/information for long-term use
  • Save and manage documents on Google Workspace, OneDrive, or elsewhere in accordance with your teams’ norms and practices
• Share detailed information about library users or their requests
  • Refer to the Patron Data Privacy Policy and the Reference Support Slack documentation for guidance
• Make HR requests; they should be sent to lib-hr@mit.edu

• Slack is not a system of record
  • The channel conversations and file retention period in Slack is 90 days. 
  • It is not recommended to use Slack for decision making because it is not a system of record. Using email is the best choice for communicating decisions, and most decisions should be logged and archived on an intranet for institutional memory.
• Decision making
  • When making decisions via Slack, make sure all affected parties are part of the conversation and have appropriate time to respond.
  • When in doubt, bring the thread to the relevant stakeholders through other methods such as conversation, meeting, email, etc
• High-frequency channels
  • There are a number of high-frequency channels in the MIT Libraries Slack, including channels for non-work conversation
    • Always check to make sure you’re in the right channel for what you are posting
    • Make sure you understand the purpose of the channel before you post
  • Users should use threaded conversations for ease in navigating conversation-heavy channels and to help organize high-frequency channels
• Nothing is confidential
  • A basic guideline is to assume that others will see what you write.

In order to make Slack more accessible, the Libraries staff should consider some of the below recommendations. 

• Add alt-text to images and GIFs
• Use linked text for URLs to clarify where the link will take somebody

Availability and Expectations

1. Updating your profile
2. Use Slack to...
3. Avoid using Slack to...
4. General considerations
5. Accessibility Recommendations

Submit questions via MIT Libraries' Help Center (Jira Service Manager).