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The way early Slack users talked about workplace messaging in the 2000s seems disturbed today. He was the “buddy” in the office, the “glue” that kept the teams together, and the reason work was fun. Of course, we now know that non-stop messaging makes it difficult to log out. But at least we can send emojis to our bosses.
In compensation for being tied to our jobs, workplace messaging has helped upend work norms. The idea that work requires a separate, stricter identity is no longer accepted.
A combination of new generations in the workforce and a pandemic-charged rise in remote work has given rise to a more casual tone. Suits, ties and other signs of formality are less popular. Email check-ins with “Sincerely” are replaced with a simple “Thanks.” Internal chats rarely have checkouts at all — other than likes. Slack and Microsoft Teams even allow workers to play video games.
California got there first. When I arrived here in 2018, I had a wardrobe full of uncomfortable work clothes and an assumption that email and phone calls were the way to communicate with colleagues. On the first day, I was introduced to quick conversations conducted by the Financial Times office in San Francisco. Within the first week, I realized that every meeting I attended would be a sweatshirt-and-sneakers gathering, and I changed my wardrobe accordingly.
The technology sector has proven that informality does not mean unprofessionalism or unproductivity. But this idea still seeps into some of the more conservative parts of society. As well as the question of exactly what type of work should be done via chat.
I thought about this while sitting in the courtroom for the trial between Epic Games and Google late last year. While the lawsuit focused on the Google Play Store, the judge seemed surprised that so much of Google's work was done via chat.
He criticized the company for allowing such communications to be treated differently from email. Auto-delete settings in messages contribute to the ephemeral tone of the conversation. However, the judge described this as suppression of evidence.
I've been using chat interchangeably with email without thinking about this. Its similarity to text messaging means it's easy to mix personal and professional conversations as well. The number of different group chats and individual messages creates a constant background noise that can be dipped in and out of in a way that feels addictive, if not always productive.
To see how that happened, you have to go back more than a decade to San Francisco in 2013. Enterprise messaging tools — or enterprise platforms — weren't new. Google has been trying to promote such a service for almost as long as email has been around, launching Google Talk in 2005, one year after Gmail. There were startups too. But it was Slack that caught fire.
The reason Slack has a video game-like tone is that it was born out of a startup that was building an online multiplayer game. When this failed to take off, founder Stuart Butterfield focused on developing the team's internal chat platform. It has proven popular with other startups who have praised the design. By 2015, tech magazine Wired wrote a story with the headline: “Shut down your office. You're all working in Slack now.
Workplace messaging companies, like Slack, say the communication method reduces demand for meetings. Emojis offer brief interactions that reduce the number of messages. These instant messages have been credited with reducing noise in open-plan offices by transmitting casual conversations over the Internet.
The downside is what happens when employees let their guard down too much and forget that they are using a work tool that is not always private. Barry Weiss pointed to Slack when she resigned from The New York Times, saying fellow workers were criticizing her on the platform and posting an ax emoji next to her name in company-wide channels.
In the last year or so, Slack has lost some of its luster. This is partly the result of a stunning $28 billion acquisition by Salesforce in 2021. Instead of being a rogue startup, it is now part of software giant Salesforce. Sales growth has declined. In the last quarter, it was 16 percent, down from 33 percent the previous year. The founders have left. Like every other technology company, it is pinning its hopes on generative artificial intelligence.
But Slack's declining popularity is not a reflection of an aversion to messaging in the workplace. It is a result of competitors like Google using their resources to grab share. The culture of informal workplace gossip you helped create isn't going anywhere.
elaine.moore@ft.com
