You can trigger an automation in Productive the moment a message is posted in a Slack channel you choose, so nobody has to manually watch Slack and react to what's happening there.
Use this when you want Slack activity to kick off an action that isn't an agent responding: like creating a task, sending an email, or posting a different Slack message.
👉 Want an agent itself to respond when it's mentioned in Slack instead? See Setting Up a Slack Trigger for an Agent.
👉 The organization-wide integration for Slack must be connected before you can use Slack as a trigger.
Adding a Slack "When" Step
Go to Settings > Automations > + New Automation.
Select When > A user makes an action, then choose External as the type. Slack Message is preselected.
Choose which channels the automation should run in:
Toggle Run in all current and future channels where @Productive is a member on to apply the trigger everywhere.
Or leave it off and select one or more channels under Select Channel(s).
Toggle Include Thread Replies on if you also want the trigger to fire for replies inside message threads.
📌 Channels appear in the list a few minutes after you invite the Productive app to that channel: type /invite @Productive in Slack.
Click Save to continue to a Check if step or straight to Then.
Adding Conditions for a Slack Trigger
Narrow down the trigger with a Check if step. Two condition attributes are available:
Content — checks the text of the Slack message. Comparators include Is, Is not, Contains, Does not contain, Is empty, and Is not empty.
Mentioned Agent — checks which agent was @-mentioned in the message, without running that agent. Comparators include Is, Is not, Contains, and Does not contain.
With Mentioned Agent, the comparator changes how multiple agents are evaluated:
Is: every listed agent must be mentioned in the same message.
Contains: at least one of the listed agents must be mentioned.
To check if your agent was mentioned in Slack, your Slack admin must allow all members to create and disable user groups (in your Slack settings).
Adding a "Then" Step
Once your When step and any Check if conditions are set, add a Then step to define what the automation does.
Common actions for a Slack-triggered automation:
Send Slack Message — post a reply back to Slack.
Send Teams Message — post the update to a Microsoft Teams channel instead.
Send Email — notify someone who doesn't use Slack.
Create Task — turn the Slack message into a task.
Send HTTP Request — send the message data to an external service or another endpoint.
📌 Send Teams Message requires its own organization-wide Teams integration: connecting Slack alone doesn't enable it.
Click Save to activate the automation.
