Slack For Dummies

The definitive, full-color guide on the collaboration tool that’s transforming how more than 12 million people work every day.
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About Slack For Dummies ℹ️
A brief summary of Slack For Dummies.

Publisher: Wiley
Pages: 384
Formats: Paperback (color), eBook
Say goodbye to the old, inefficient way of working.
Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to be less overwhelmed and more efficient at work? More specifically, imagine the following:
- Never receiving another irrelevant mass email or being CC’d on a mind-numbing 30-email thread
- Quickly and easily locating key documents and conversations
- Employees at your organization were more engaged—whether at the office or working remotely
- Working in an environment in which collaboration and communication didn’t resemble Office Space
- How much your organization would benefit from a single and secure knowledge repository
- Regaining control of your professional life
Every day, more than 12 million employees don’t have to imagine this alternate reality. They live in it. By using a remarkably useful, intuitive, flexible, popular, and affordable and tool called Slack, they have fundamentally changed how they work.
Slack’s corporate mission is to change where work happens. In tens of thousands of cases, it has succeeded—often in unexpected ways. Rare is the employee who wants to return to a pre-Slack work existence.
But how do you get started?
To be fair, Slack can be a little overwhelming for people who’ve worked out of their inboxes for years or decades.
Enter Slack For Dummies. My ninth book is a full-color, approachable, and comprehensive text with one goal: to help you understand how to use Slack to make your work life better. This easy-to-use reference guide:
- Shows you how to navigate Slack’s user interface and understand its key features
- Guides you through the process of creating workspaces, channels, and threads
- Provides additional context to group and individual messages and, in the process, reduce employee cognitive load
- Demonstrates how to avoid making rookie mistakes that haunt organizations down the road
- Explains how to extend the power of native Slack with valuable third-party apps and integrations such as Dropbox, GoogleDrive, Outlook, Simple Poll, Trello, and more
Slack For Dummies is an informative and highly readable resource that will change the way that you communicate and collaborate with your colleagues—for the better and for good. Once you go Slack, you’ll never go back.
Updates
March 18, 2020: Yeah, Slack blew up its UI. Don’t worry, though. Slack For Dummies is based upon the new version of Slack. As such, directions, photos, and functionality are all current, baby.
November 6, 2019: Slack CTO Cal Henderson will be penning the book’s foreword.
Book Trailer
A 70-second video of the book.
Slack Tips & Resources
Quick thoughts on getting the most out of the collaboration tool.
Excerpt
Here are a few Slackalicious chapters from the book.
FAQ
Does the book reflect the most recent Slack UI?
Indeed it does. Slack generously gave me early access to its new UI and I took full advantage of the opportunity. No one wanted this book to be DOA.
Is the book geared towards regular users, admins, or developers?
As I’ve said many times, when you try to write a book for everyone, then you write a book for no one. In the case of Slack For Dummies, I focus on the first two constituencies. At a few points, I mention resources for developers. Still, those who want to build their own third-party apps will have to look elsewhere.
I enjoyed the book. Do you offer Slack training for organizations?
I already use Slack. Would Slack For Dummies benefit me?
Odds are that you’re not familiar with every Slack feature, option, and setting. I’d be astonished if experienced users don’t learn a great deal from Slack For Dummies.
Were Slack employees involved in the writing of the book?
Yes. I shared early versions of key chapters with senior Slack folks. In some cases, they clarified points that I could have made clearer. Make no mistake: This feedback was
Can I find it in bookstores?
Depends on the store.
Related Blog Posts
Longer-form musings on the book, the tool, and the problems they both solve.
Reviews & Ratings
What people are saying about the book.
Press
Articles, interviews, AMAs, and more.
Slack Blog: How a professor turned his passion for Slack into an old-school guide
I appear on The Virtual Excellence Show with @rossdawson talking about Zoom and Slack.
Unite Your Virtual Team – Read Slack for Dummies
Slack for Dummies Gives Readers a Quick How-To on This Popular Collaboration Tool
I’ll be holding court with the Remote Daily folks in an interactive session called Slack: Going Beyond the Basics at 1 pm EST on Sept 30.
Errata
Issues with the first printing of the book.
The publisher and I are going to fix them in the second printing—probably in September of 2020.
Updated: July 20, 2020