Slack launches ‘Lists’ to transform conversations into actionable work

Slack has rolled out an innovative feature known as Slack Lists, aimed at integrating project management seamlessly into the collaborative environment where teams interact daily. This new tool enables users to capture, organize, and monitor projects, requests, and deadlines right within Slack, eliminating the need to switch between different applications. The introduction of Lists addresses a common pain point associated with traditional project management tools, which often fall short of meeting the practical needs of employees. With Lists, conversations can be transformed into structured tasks that include fields for assignee, due date, status, and priority. This allows teams to sort, filter, and group tasks, enhancing visibility and accountability. Denise Dresser, CEO of Slack, emphasized the utility of Lists, stating, "With Lists, you can turn conversations in Slack into actionable tasks that drive work forwards. Loose next steps shared in a project channel can now be effectively tracked across a team." She believes that incorporating project management directly into Slack will empower teams across various organizations to complete projects more efficiently and boost productivity. Lists also feature integration with Workflow Builder, facilitating automation, and allow users to embed Lists within a Slack canvas, complete with project timelines. Additionally, it will soon enable users to save messages directly to a List and provide project recaps and instant search capabilities powered by Slack AI. During its pilot phase, Slack discovered that 77% of testers reported increased productivity thanks to Lists. One of the early adopters, Marriott Digital Services, expressed enthusiasm about leveraging Lists for project management. Lori Drake, the Director of System Strategy at Marriott, noted, "We’re excited to use Lists to manage projects and track requests, and think Lists could unlock significant time savings for our team." Slack envisions that Lists will be versatile across various industries, whether it's managing sales accounts, IT requests, incident resolution, or planning marketing campaigns. By merging conversations with project tracking, Slack aims to minimize redundant work and reduce reliance on multiple external applications.