With so many employees moving online, using Slack is a great way to keep your office engaged. However, managing employee engagement and productivity while remote can be a real challenge. Thankfully, using a Slack channel with integrated apps can combine productivity and employee entertainment in the same location.

From combining the best aspects of a project management platform with social chatting abilities to integrating employee acknowledgment into one location, here’s how using Slack can increase both fun and productivity for your remote team.

How Slack Apps Merge Productivity and Entertainment

Slack apps like CultureBot create an online space that mimics the social aspects of office spaces. With these apps on board, you can craft workplace culture on a virtual scale without feeling like your team spends all day checking emails.

Social Slack apps can significantly boost team morale, making it much easier to connect with your team, virtual or not. After all, starting random conversations with coworkers using watercooler functions can be a great way to show team members you’re engaged with their day-to-day life.

Slack channels are like micro social bubbles, perfect for coordinating events, chatting with coworkers, and working on projects. You can create a virtual workspace that combines entertainment with productivity by tailoring these channels correctly. Working within a virtual format doesn't have to drain your team's life. Virtual channels are a perfect, lasting way to share employee acknowledgments and boost team morale.

By crafting a custom workspace where employee shout outs are encouraged and the standard social spaces are encouraged, and productivity is blended with social features, you can use Slack to boost your team mood and make working within Slack fun and productive at the same time.

Slack Tips and Tricks for Remote Teams

While Slack is an excellent tool for remote teams, there are a few general tips and tricks to make working virtually smooth sailing. From muting unused channels to managing notifications, here are some general tips to stave off Slack fatigue and keep working virtually fun and productive.

Manage Notifications

Before you get flooded by Slack notifications, take a moment to mute channels you will not use. This includes non-work channels you may follow in other Slack servers. Keeping your notifications to a minimum can reduce burnout and make it easier to tell when something needs your attention.

Encourage your employees to cultivate a healthy relationship with Slack, and set notification mutes when off the clock. This ensures that burnout stays minimal, and Slack notifications notify employees when something needs attention.

Craft Channels

One of the benefits of Slack is the ability to craft several channels for different topics. However, there's more to making a channel than hitting "make a channel." First, you want to set a clear description for each channel and some general rules for the chat. You should also follow a naming convention to reduce confusion and make it much easier for employees to find the channel they want.

You want to create dedicated channels for status updates and internal communications. Having separate channels for different topics can revolutionize your Slack coordination, so be sure to balance public and private channels and work to craft collaboration channels, announcement channels, and more, all to streamline management.

Ensure you set guidelines for crafting new channels so your Slack isn't flooded with new, dead channels after a few days. You can streamline communication and craft a virtual workplace by adequately managing channels and integrations. However, slow channels are like empty office rooms: they waste resources and time. So instead, do a regular purge of dead channels to keep your Slack clean and streamlined and reduce Slack fatigue.

Threads Are a Must-Have

This tip goes hand-in-hand with moderation, but make sure that employees use the proper communication features for Slack. Keeping conversations in threads can clean up a channel and reduce notifications. Make sure that things like mass pings and @here are saved for emergencies only.

By curating your Slack channels, you create a productive space that staves off burnout and encourages socialization. However, flooded channels and bogged-down notifications do the opposite of boosting productivity, so good moderation and Slack etiquette can improve your Slack channels.

Prepare for Downtime

Inevitably Slack is going to crash once or twice throughout your work. Ensuring your team is prepared for Slack going offline can boost productivity and stave off office panic. Set up a Zoom channel for when Slack fails or set up an email chain for the inevitable failure of technology. Whichever you go with, ensure you continue coordinating without Slack to save time on projects.

You can use other apps and integrations to keep your office flowing in the case of Slack failure. However, whatever you choose for your emergency Slack backup, ensure that all employees know the routine, so you don't have lost productivity or stressed-out contractors waiting for Slack to come back online.

Automation Is Your Friend

One of the benefits of Slack apps is automation. In base Slack, you can automate message reminders and several other features that make individual message management much more accessible. With Slack apps, you can integrate critical functions, making it easier to manage Slack channels, engage employees, and respond to questions.

Take a good look at your Slack channels and note what tasks moderators or managers repeatedly do. These tasks are ideal for automation, as they’ll increase productivity and help stave off moderator and manager burnout.

Use Multiple Slack Apps

While many Slack apps combine the best of the best into one platform, keep in mind you can use more than one Slack app for your company. If you work best with other integrations or need several product management apps, using more than one Slack app is a great way to increase workplace productivity and customize your virtual workspace.

For example, your team could benefit from Google Drive integration alongside a social app. Being open to several app integrations can boost productivity and transform your Slack channels.

Take a moment to analyze what your Slack channel needs. Ask employees what tasks they'd like assistance with or ways their productivity could benefit. You can streamline communication and boost overall productivity by polling team members about the best communication tools for the entire team. This also includes things like game apps and fun app integrations. Icebreaker games and employee morale-boosting add-ons can also increase overall morale, boosting productivity.