After completing the initial configuration, you can manage PagerDuty incidents in Slack.

Link User Accounts

In order for users to be able to perform PagerDuty actions from within Slack or create new channel connections on the PagerDuty side, users must first link their PagerDuty and Slack user accounts. This user-linking can be performed by each user as soon as the initial configuration has been completed for a given PagerDuty account and Slack workspace and can be initiated from either PagerDuty or Slack. The following describes how to link user accounts from Slack:

1. In a public Slack channel, run the command /pd oncall, then, if prompted, choose the desired PagerDuty account.
2. You'll receive a private message prompt in the same Slack channel; click the provided hyperlink to link your accounts.
3. You’ll be directed to log into your PagerDuty account (make sure that you select the correct region and correct sign-on method (SSO or not) appropriate to your PagerDuty account); once you’ve completed authentication to the PagerDuty account, your Slack and PagerDuty users have been successfully linked.

Create and Link Incident Slack Channels

Dedicated Channel

Dedicated incident channels help your team work and resolve each incident in one place. When using a dedicated channel for an incident, you have access to additional features to improve the efficiency of your response, such as our dedicated channel commands.

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Note

Each incident may have only one dedicated channel.

Create an Incident Dedicated Channel

You can automate channel creation using Incident workflows, or you can manually create channels, as needed.

Create an Incident Dedicated Channel Automatically

Automatically create a dedicated channel for your incidents by configuring an Incident Workflow that uses the Create Incident Dedicated Channel workflow action. Please see our Incident Workflows article for more information.

Create an Incident Dedicated Channel Manually

In the PagerDuty Web App:

On an active incident, click into the details page and then click Set Channel to the right of Dedicated Channel.

In Slack:

On an existing incident card incident in Slack, click Create Dedicated Channel (this option may instead list under the More actions menu, depending on your configuration).

Notification Channel

Notification channels help you bring awareness of an incident to multiple channels in Slack. You can link these notification channels when an incident opens, or as the incident progresses and you need to inform additional groups.

When you link a notification channel to an incident, PagerDuty sends an incident card to the notification channel. This card continuously updates as the incident progresses to reflect the current state of the incident.

If the incident also has a dedicated incident channel, a Join Dedicated Channel button displays on the incident card, making it easy for additional responders or stakeholders to join the response.

An incident may have up to three notification channels linked.

Link an Incident Notification Channel

You can automatically link notification channels with incident workflows, or you can manually link channels, as needed.

Link Notification Channels Automatically

Automatically link notification channels to your incident by configuring an Incident Workflow, or multiple, that use the Create Incident Dedicated Channel workflow action. Please see our Incident Workflows article for more information.

Link a Notification Channel Manually

In the PagerDuty Web App:

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User Permissions

• When you click Set Channels you may receive a prompt to authorize the connection between your PagerDuty and Slack accounts.
• When linking notification channels, you will only be able to view channels that you have permission to access in Slack.
• If your PagerDuty account is connected to multiple Slack workspaces, you will have the option to select which workspace to use.

On an active incident, click into the details page and then click Set Channels to the right of Notification Channels.

Available Actions

Slash Commands

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PagerDuty EU Service Region

If your PagerDuty account is in the EU service region, you'll need to use /pdeu to run all slash commands instead of /pd.

Help Command

Running /pd or /pd help in Slack will return a message with suggestions for which action to take, and a directory of all available incident actions. This help response is interactive, and you may click the provided buttons to take the listed action.

The help command differs if you are running it inside or outside of a dedicated incident channel to provide an accurate listing of commands relevant for your current situation. Below is an example help response from a dedicated incident channel:

General Commands

General commands can be run anywhere in Slack. These commands can be used to view help information, trigger an incident or manage PagerDuty configuration.

Dedicated Channel Commands

You can run dedicated channel commands in an Incident Dedicated Channel. These commands enable taking efficient actions on the incident. For example, you can type /pd ack in the Slack message box to quickly acknowledge the incident.

Additionally, you can invoke many actions in a one-step, or two-step process. For example, to add a note to an incident, you can type /pd note, which will open a modal to type your note. Alternatively, you can type /pd note This is my note to immediately add a note with the contents This is my note to the current incident.

A full directory of actions and commands is listed below:

Incident Card Actions

When using a dedicated channel, notification channels or service/team channel connections, PagerDuty will send an incident card to the channel. These incident cards display buttons, allowing responders to take action similar to slash commands in a dedicated channel. Incident cards display the following actions:

• Acknowledge: Acknowledge the incident.
• Resolve: Resolve the incident.
• Join Dedicated Channel: If a dedicated channel exists for the incident, a button displays to join the dedicated channel.
• Run a Workflow: Run an Incident Workflow.
• More actions…: Select the dropdown to access the below actions. Note: Not all actions are available on all pricing plans. Please contact Sales to upgrade to a pricing plan that offers any features not present in your account.
  • Add a Note : Add a note to the incident.
  • Add Responder: Add a responder to the incident.
  • View Details: View incident details within the PagerDuty web app.
  • Add Task: Create and assign an Incident Task.
  • View Tasks: View existing Incident Tasks for this incident.
  • Assign Roles: Assign Incident Roles to responders.
  • Change Priority : Change an incident’s priority.
  • Reassign: Reassign the incident to another user.
  • Escalate: Escalate the incident to the next on-call responder.
  • Create Channel: Create a dedicated Slack channel for the current incident.
  • New Status Update: Create a new status update for the incident.
  • Change Type: Change the incident type.
  • Run an Action: Run an Automation Action.

View Impacted Applications in Slack

View customer service application impact during an incident in Slack. Services with Salesforce or Zendesk integrations will list the number of cases related to the current incident, with links to individual cases.

To view individual cases:

1. To the right of the application you would like to view, click [#] Cases.
2. You will see a list of related cases in the modal that appears. Click a case number to navigate to the integrated application and view the case.

Create an Incident Trigger Slack Workflow

Slack workflows can be used to trigger PagerDuty incidents via Slack with pre-configured details such as the associated service. This option is useful for employees who do not have PagerDuty licenses, but still need to be able to trigger PagerDuty incidents in Slack.

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Slack’s New Workflows

Slack Workflows are developed and maintained by Slack.

With the deprecation of Slack’s legacy workflows, we highly recommend utilizing Slack's new Workflow Builder for creating incident trigger workflows.

The following sample workflow uses the new Workflow Builder’s PagerDuty connector steps. For issues or concerns with these connector steps or a Slack workflow, please reach out to Slack’s Support team.

1. In your Slack desktop app, click the top left Workspace dropdown and select Tools  Workflow Builder.

2. Click + New Workflow  Build Workflow. Select the option for how you’d like to start the workflow. Enter the required information, if any, then click Continue.

3. Next, you will create a form for users to enter information about the incident. On the Steps panel, search for or select Collect info in a form.

4. On the Collect info in a form modal:

   1. Enter the following information:

      Field	Value
      Form Title	Enter a title for the form, such as Trigger PD incident.

   2. Click + Add Question.
      On the Question 1 modal, enter the following information:

      Field	Value
      Your question	Enter Title. This will be the title of the incident that triggers.
      Question type	Select Short answer
      Make this required	Enable this checkbox.

   3. Click Done, then click + Add Question.
      On the Question 2 modal, enter the following information:

      Field	Value
      Your question	Enter Details. This will populate the custom details of the incident that triggers.
      Question type	Select Short answer
      Make this required	Enable this checkbox.

   4. Click Done, then click Save on the Collect info in a form modal.

5. Next, on the Steps panel, search or select the PagerDuty connector’s Trigger an incident step.

6. On the Trigger an incident modal:

   1. Uncheck the Generate a form to collect info for this step checkbox.

   2. Click Edit next to the option PagerDuty account being used for this step.

   3. On the PagerDuty accounts modal, select whose PagerDuty account should be used for triggering an incident:

      1. To use a different PagerDuty user account, click Change under Account for workflow building, then select an account from the list of connected accounts, or click Connect to authenticate a new account. After selecting a PagerDuty account, click Done.
      2. Under Account for workflow use, select the PagerDuty account to use for triggering an incident, then click Save.

   4. Click Next.

   5. Enter the following information:

      Field	Value
      Incident title	Click Insert a variable and select Answer to: Title to add the Title value collected from the form created in step 4.
      Incident details	Click Insert a variable and select Answer to: Details to add the Details value collected from the form created in step 4.
      Priority (optional)	Optionally select the preferred Priority for the new incident.
      Service	Select the preferred Service for the new incident.
      Escalation policy	Select the preferred Escalation Policy for the new incident.

   6. Click Save.

7. If you would like to add an optional message when someone uses this workflow, continue to step 8. If you do not want to add a message, skip to step 9.

8. (Optional) On the Steps panel, search for or select the Send a message to a channel step.

   On the Send a message to a channel modal, enter the following information:

   Field	Value
   Select a channel	Select Channel where the workflow was used.
   Add a message	Enter your preferred message to be sent with the workflow. Click Insert a variable under the message form to include variables that contain PagerDuty Incident, Escalation Policy, Service, and/or Team data.

   Click Save.

9. Click Finish Up in the upper right. Enter the workflow’s details and permissions, then click Publish.

Use an Incident Trigger Slack Workflow

1. In your Slack desktop app, select a channel with an Incident Trigger Slack Workflow configured click the Shortcuts at the bottom left of your text field select the Trigger PD incident workflow.
2. Enter the Title and Details for the incident and click Submit.

This will create an incident in PagerDuty, and you will also be able to see the incident details in your Slack channel.

Add a Slack Contact Method

Once the Slack integration has been configured, you can add Slack as an incident contact method. Please see our User Profile article for more information.