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Connecting Slack, end to end

From "nothing connected" to an agent answering in a channel and approvals landing in Slack — with the routing rules explained.

Connect it

  1. Open Surfaces and turn on Slack. You will authorize a workspace — use an account that can add apps to the channels you care about.
  2. Pick the agent that handles inbound Slack work. One agent per surface keeps behavior predictable.
  3. Set routing: which channels the pod listens to, and whether it responds to every message or only mentions. Start with mentions-only in one channel.
  4. In Slack, mention the bot with a real request. Watch the reply arrive in-channel, then open Conversations in Lemma to see the same thread with every tool call visible.
  5. If a workflow has approval steps, assignees with connected Slack get those approvals as messages — approve without leaving the channel.

Routing rules of thumb

  • Mentions-only in shared channels; every-message only in dedicated channels like #support-inbox.
  • Separate noisy intake (every message) from collaboration channels (mentions) using two routing rules.
  • The agent answers with its scoped knowledge — if it should know your policies, grant it the policies folder.

Surfaces vs connectors

Connecting Slack as a surface lets work reach the pod. Connecting Slack as a connector lets agents and flows act on Slack — post to channels, read history — as a tool. Many pods use both.