Connecting watsonx Employee Support agents to Slack

Connect IBM watsonx Employee Support agents to Slack to quickly use the capabilities of AI agents built-in for HR use cases right from your Slack workspace.

Before you begin

  • You must have access to a Slack workspace.
  • You must have an account on watsonx Orchestrate.
Important:This feature is available only to select clients.

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Add the watsonx Employee Support agent to a Slack workspace

Follow the steps to add the agent to a Slack workspace:

  1. From the menu of watsonx Orchestrate, click Discover.
  2. In the Catalog, search for the watsonx Employee Support agent that you want to connect to Slack. Filter by "HR" category for an optimized view of the agents available.
  3. Click the agent, and click Use as template. It redirects you to the agent details in the Agent builder.
  4. In the agent, click Deploy to make the resources of this agent available for users to use.
  5. In the Behavior tab, under the Channels section, go to Slack and click Set up. It redirects you to the Slack authorization page.
  6. Choose the workspace that you want to add the agent from the workspace selector, and review the resources that the agent needs to access in the workspace.
  7. Click Submit to send your request.
Important:A Workspace Owner needs to approve your request to connect the app to the Slack workspace.

After the Workspace Owner approves the request, you must repeat the steps 5, 6, and 7 to ensure that your agent is authorized for the app.

For more information, see Manage app approval for your workspace in Slack Help Center.

Using the watsonx Employee Support agent from Slack

After you add the agent to a Slack workspace, you can now use it. From the Slack window, click the watsonx Employee Support agent under the Apps section.

Prompt the agent by selecting one of the suggested prompts or by typing your question for the use cases that the agent covers.

For example, you can try asking "How many vacation days do I have left?" or "What are the holidays for my location?".

For new results, start a new chat with the agent.

Removing the connection

  1. From the menu of watsonx Orchestrate, click Build to go to the Agent builder.
  2. In the Agent builder home page, click the watsonx Employee Support agent to open its details.
  3. In the Behavior tab, under the Channels section, go to Slack and click Remove.