For most teams, Slack is where work happens — where bugs get reported, where decisions get debated, where someone says "can someone summarize this thread?" and four people open it.
Okou meets you there. Once installed, Okou is a Slack app you can @mention in any channel or DM directly. The same workflows, the same connectors, the same permissions as the web app — but in the flow of your team's conversation.
Installing
- Open the Where Okou works page in your workspace and click Add to Slack.
- Pick the Slack workspace and grant the scopes Okou requests:
- Read channel and DM messages where it's added
- Post messages and reactions
- Read user profile info (for tagging and addressing)
- Upload files (for attached artifacts)
If your Slack workspace requires admin approval for new apps, the install request goes to a Slack admin. The Where Okou works page shows the status.
How you use Okou in Slack
Three primary patterns, all of them work without any setup beyond the install:
DM Okou directly. For private work, drafts, or anything you don't want broadcast. The DM behaves like a web chat — multiple messages back and forth, full chat log, files supported.
Common Slack workflows
The patterns the Okou team uses, day in and day out:
- Channel digests on a schedule. A scheduled automation runs every Monday and posts a week-in-review to
#engineeringor#cs. See Automations. - Customer reply drafts. Connect Gmail, Front, or Zendesk and have Okou watch for new customer mail. When something arrives, Okou drafts a reply in your voice and DMs it to you for approval.
Etiquette and norms
A few patterns that work better than others, based on what teams settle into:
- Be specific about output destination. "DM me" or "post in
#cs-replies" — vague destinations confuse the result. - Use DMs for sensitive work. Drafts of customer replies, financial actions, or private analysis belong in DMs, not in shared channels.
- Don't add Okou to channels it doesn't need. Permissions are scoped by channel; minimizing access is cleaner.
Permissions in Slack
Slack permissions are scoped per workspace, not per channel. Okou can only read channels it's a member of, but actions Okou takes (post, react, upload) follow the same rules.
If you remove Okou from a channel:
- It immediately loses the ability to read that channel's history
- It can no longer post or react in that channel
- Old chat logs still show the messages Okou saw while it was a member
To restrict Okou to a single sensitive channel without giving it the rest of the workspace, you can install a second Okou in a separate Slack workspace; that's the right escape hatch for high-isolation use cases.
Common pitfalls
- Okou not responding. Check that it's been invited to the channel. Check the Where Okou works page for connection health.
- Replies in the wrong place. If a workflow posts to the wrong channel, edit its instruction to name the destination explicitly.
- Permission denied. When Okou needs a connector that's not authorized, it'll DM the requester with an authorize link. Don't ignore those DMs.
- Duplicate Okou installs. If a workspace has Okou installed multiple times (different OAuth sessions), one will win. The Where Okou works page shows which.
What's next
- See Workflows for capturing recurring channel work.
- See Automations for posting digests without being asked.
- See Permissions for what Okou can and can't do in your Slack.