slack-triage

Slack Triage Plugin for Claude

A plugin template that turns Claude into your Slack triage assistant — one who knows which messages need a reply, which threads need a glance, and which 200 channel messages are noise you can skip entirely.

What This Is

This is a plugin for Claude (works with both Cowork and Claude Code). Once configured, you can say "check my Slack" and Claude will:

• Scan your workspace using the Slack MCP connector (DMs, mentions, threads, priority channels)
• Classify every message into three tiers: Reply Needed, Review, and Noise
• Draft replies for the urgent ones, matching your Slack voice (more casual than email)
• Summarize channel activity so you know what happened without reading 400 messages

The triage handles the morning catch-up problem: you open Slack, see 47 unread channels, and spend 30 minutes scrolling before you've actually done anything. This gives you a prioritized action list instead.

Why This Approach

Most Slack notification management relies on mute/unmute decisions per channel. That's a binary choice applied to a nuanced problem. A channel might be 95% noise but 5% critical — you can't mute it, but you also can't read everything.

This takes a different approach: Claude reads your Slack activity (DMs, mentions, threads, channel messages) and makes judgment calls the way a good chief of staff would. It knows which people and channels matter most, which threads you started and haven't closed, and which bot notifications are informational vs. ignorable.

The key insight is channel-priority mapping. You define which channels are priority (team channels, incident channels), which are watch-only (announcements, project updates), and which are noise (social, random). Combined with people-priority (your manager, direct reports, key stakeholders), 80% of messages get classified instantly.

This pairs well with the Email Triage Plugin for a complete morning briefing, and the Family Assistant Skill for contact context. But it works standalone too.

Getting Started

1. Install the plugin

For Cowork users: Drop the plugin folder into whichever folder you select when starting a Cowork session.

For Claude Code users: Copy it into your project or home directory:

cp -r slack-triage-plugin ~/.claude/plugins/slack-triage-plugin

2. Connect Slack

This plugin requires the Slack MCP connector. In Cowork, enable the Slack connector from the connectors menu. In Claude Code, configure the Slack MCP server in your .claude.json.

The Slack MCP connector provides: slack_read_channel, slack_search_public_and_private, slack_search_users, and slack_search_channels.

3. Customize the workspace config

Open skills/slack-triage/references/workspace-config.md and fill in:

Section	What to configure
Workspace	Your Slack display name and user ID
Priority Channels	Channels where messages are likely to need your attention
Watch Channels	Channels you want to stay aware of but rarely act on
Muted Channels	Channels to summarize as counts only
Key People	People whose DMs always get Tier 1 treatment
Bot Filters	Bots whose notifications are Tier 2 (informational) vs. Tier 3 (noise)

The most impactful customization is the channel priority table. Start with your top 5 channels and your manager/direct reports.

4. Start using it

/slack              → Full workspace triage
/slack dms          → Only direct messages
/slack mentions     → Only @mentions
/slack threads      → Only threads you're in
/slack work         → Only work-related channels
/messages           → Alias for /slack

Or just say:

• "Check my Slack"
• "What did I miss on Slack?"
• "Catch me up on messages"
• "Draft a reply to #3"
• "Summarize what happened this week"

File Structure

slack-triage-plugin/
├── .claude-plugin/
│   └── plugin.json          # Plugin metadata
├── .mcp.json                # Slack MCP connector config
├── commands/
│   ├── slack.md             # /slack slash command
│   └── messages.md          # /messages alias
├── skills/
│   └── slack-triage/
│       ├── SKILL.md         # Triage logic, tier definitions, voice guidelines
│       └── references/
│           └── workspace-config.md  # Your channel/people priority config
├── LICENSE
└── README.md

How the Three Tiers Work

Tier 1 — Reply Needed. Someone is waiting on you. Direct messages, @mentions with questions, threads you started with unresolved asks, escalations, and messages from priority people. These are numbered so you can say "draft a reply to #2" and Claude will pull up the full thread context and draft something in your Slack voice.