Hand your Dot work from a Slack thread: mention it there, but it answers only you until told otherwise

#What changed

Nothing shipped today. This is a working pattern that's easy to miss. On Oct 6, Simon Smith (@_simonsmith) posted that he could hand his Dot a task from a thread inside a Slack channel, not only from a DM. OpenAI's Dots contact-methods page backs this up: once Slack is connected in your Dot's profile, you can message it directly or add it to a channel and mention it in a thread. It is the same Dot with the same memory across ChatGPT, calls, Slack and Teams, but a Slack conversation only shows what was said in Slack.

#Who is affected

Anyone using a Dot alongside a team in Slack. The channel-thread mention is described for Slack; Teams is listed as a contact method too, but the docs don't spell out the same thread behavior there.

#What to do now

• Connect Slack in your Dot's profile, invite the Dot to the channel, and mention it in the thread where the context already lives instead of re-explaining the task in a DM.
• Expect it to answer only you. If you want it to reply to teammates, tell it so explicitly. Smith saw the same thing when he added his Dot to DM threads.
• Before posting something from a private conversation into a channel, your Dot may message you privately to ask what it is allowed to share. Answer that and it can carry on.
• Being in a channel is not monitoring. If you want the Dot to watch a channel, name the channels, what to look for and when to notify you, then ask it to confirm the recurring task.
• Split where updates go, for example routine progress in ChatGPT and decisions brought to you in Slack.

#What is not confirmed

• The docs page doesn't say which plans include Slack for Dots, so check your workspace.
• Whether thread delegation works the same way in Microsoft Teams isn't documented.
• Smith's note about DM threads is his own report and has not been independently tested by DotsFeed.

Sources: Simon Smith on X (https://x.com/_simonsmith/status/2107585497769935135) and OpenAI's Dots contact-methods docs (https://learn.chatgpt.com/docs/dots/channels).