Slack is proud to serve as the digital HQ for all types of teams, empowering them to work when and how they choose, no matter what industry they’re in or which requirements they need to meet. That’s why Slack is the preferred solution for so many government agencies, like the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the General Services Administration's 18F Office, as well as the organizations that work with them.
Teams like these face unique challenges: With the ongoing shift to digital-first collaboration, they need flexible, inclusive technology. But given the sensitive content and nature of their work, they also have to comply with strict government regulations around data security and privacy, which can limit their software options.
So after extensive testing and co-creating with our customers, we’re launching GovSlack in July 2022. With GovSlack, government agencies and those they work with can enable their teams to seamlessly collaborate in their digital headquarters, while keeping security and compliance at the forefront. Here are some key features of GovSlack:
And GovSlack is a natural companion to tools like Salesforce’s Government Cloud Plus, an instance of Salesforce Customer 360 designed for government organizations. With a CRM and collaboration platform that support compliance efforts, governments and their partners can achieve agency goals faster and deliver on constituent expectations.
“Government agencies and their partners, colleagues and contractors can now work faster and more flexibly in a secure digital HQ. With all their tools, workflows and integrations in Slack, institutions can empower their people and level up collaboration without compromising on compliance.”
– Rob Seaman, SVP Product, Enterprise, Slack
Organizations that work with the U.S. government can also be subject to strict federal regulations. That includes companies like Lockheed Martin, another pilot user of GovSlack.
The global security and aerospace company relies on Slack to connect its 114,000-person workforce spanning 400 facilities and 50 countries, according to Tim Lewis, Lockheed Martin’s director of digital workplace services. With GovSlack, Lockheed Martin will be able to bring more work into Slack, including projects with government partners.
“The data compliance requirements will allow us to do more work inside of Slack as a defence contractor. GovSlack has the potential to open up additional use cases and new customers, both internally and externally.”
– Tim Lewis, Director of Digital Workplace Services, Lockheed Martin
GovSlack will also feature a directory of curated applications, including platform, security and compliance apps, categorized by certification level. That way, GovSlack users can easily find and enable integrations that align with their security requirements—like Okta, the leading user identity management provider.
“Government organizations have unique access and authentication needs,” says Katy Mann, Okta’s Vice President, Federal. “That means they need a trusted identity partner, and Okta has the power to enable efficient
and secure connections at scale. We’re proud to serve as a GovSlack partner and look forward to supporting organizations as they deploy the new service.”
Box, the cloud-based file storage and collaboration service, will be another available integration for GovSlack customers.
“Thousands of government agencies already trust Box with their most sensitive content, and now with GovSlack, agencies that require the highest levels of security and support for compliance will be able to leverage the power of the Box Content Cloud within their Slack workplace,” says Murtaza Masood, the managing director of state and local government at Box. “Using Box and Slack together to securely communicate and collaborate will help government customers simplify the flow of information internally and provide a deeper citizen engagement externally, taking the work out of work.”
Additional apps optimized to work with GovSlack will be available in the GovSlack app directory.
GovSlack can help fundamentally reshape how work gets done for government agencies and their partner organizations. For now, GovSlack will only be available in the U.S.
To learn more, visit slack.com/solutions/govslack. And if you’re interested in trying GovSlack, please contact us. [#]
Supporting government requirements
While Slack already meets or exceeds many industry security requirements, GovSlack instances will run in AWS GovCloud data centers and are designed to support key government security standards:
ITAR, the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, are a set of directives that restrict and control the export of defense and military technologies to safeguard U.S. national security and foreign policy objectives
FedRAMP High, a federal program that promotes the adoption of secure cloud services for the government’s most sensitive unclassified data*
DoD SRG IL 4, security requirements for cloud-based solutions that deal with unclassified information, protected health information and other sensitive data*