Slack Huddles let you have quick audio and video conversations in your workspace. But unlike Zoom or Teams, Slack doesn't record calls. This means important discussions just disappear unless someone takes notes.

Say your marketing team has a weekly Slack Huddle about campaign strategies. Without recording, you might forget crucial details about budgets or target demographics by the time you get back to work. That's where recording tools come in handy.

Recording with AI assistants

The best way to record Slack calls is with AI meeting assistants that capture and transcribe conversations automatically. These tools listen to your computer's audio and turn speech into text.

Circleback works well for this. It records audio from any app on your computer, including Slack Huddles, without making other people install anything. When you start a Slack call, it detects the audio and starts recording and transcribing right away.

If your sales team has a Slack Huddle about quarterly targets, Circleback would capture everything, identify who's speaking, and create a summary with key points and action items. You'd get details like "Sarah mentioned the Q4 target of $2M revenue" and "Action item: John to follow up with Enterprise client by Friday."

Manual recording

You can also use your computer's built-in recording tools. Windows has Voice Recorder, and Mac has QuickTime Player for screen recording with audio. But you have to remember to start and stop recording manually, and you don't get automatic transcription.

If your product team has a sudden Slack Huddle about a bug fix, someone would need to remember to hit record, check audio levels, and transcribe everything later. That takes time and you might miss things.

Setting up Circleback

Getting Circleback to work with Slack calls is simple. After signing up, you install the app on your computer. It runs in the background and detects when you're in a Slack call.

You'll need to give Circleback permission to access your computer's audio. This lets it capture everyone's voice clearly, whether they're using headphones, speakers, or built-in mics.

Automatic transcription

Once set up, Circleback transcribes your Slack calls as they happen. The AI can tell different speakers apart, even when multiple people talk at once or have different audio quality.

During a cross-team Slack Huddle, Circleback would identify each person and show "Marketing Manager: We need to adjust the campaign timeline" and "Engineering Lead: The API integration will be complete by Tuesday." This speaker identification helps with big teams where it's hard to tell voices apart.

Smart summaries

Circleback doesn't just transcribe - it creates summaries that pull out key themes, decisions, and action items. The AI looks at how the conversation flows and finds the important stuff that needs follow-up.

If a customer success team has a Slack Huddle about a difficult client, Circleback would automatically summarize the client's concerns, proposed solutions, who's responsible for what, and agreed timelines. You can easily share this with people who missed the call.

Getting good audio quality

To get clear recordings, have people use headphones to cut down on echo and background noise. This matters especially when team members work from home or noisy places.

Make sure everyone has a good internet connection too. Bad connections create choppy audio that's hard to transcribe. If someone's connection is poor, ask them to try a different location or device.

Privacy and consent

Always tell people when you're recording and get their okay first. Even though Slack doesn't show recording notifications, you should be upfront about capturing conversations.

Set up team rules about when and how you'll record Slack calls. Maybe you record all client calls for quality checks, but only record internal brainstorming when someone asks for it.

Organizing recordings

Create a system for organizing your recorded Slack calls. With Circleback, you can sort recordings by project, team, or topic so you can find specific conversations later.

Your support team might organize recordings by client name, problem type, or whether the issue got resolved. This system becomes really useful when you need to look back at old conversations or track ongoing problems.

Working with other tools

Circleback connects with business tools you already use. After recording a Slack call, you can automatically add the meeting notes to your CRM, project management tools, or documentation.

If your sales team has a Slack Huddle with a potential client, Circleback can update the client's CRM record with discussion points, next steps, and follow-up reminders. This keeps important information from getting lost and helps different team members stay in sync.

Automated follow-ups

Circleback can create follow-up emails based on your Slack call recordings. The AI looks at the conversation and writes professional summaries to send to participants or people who missed the call.

If your product team has a Slack Huddle about feature priorities, Circleback could write a follow-up email listing the features discussed, their priority order, and who owns what, then send it to the broader product team and stakeholders.

Fixing common problems

If audio capture isn't working, check that Circleback has permission to access your computer's audio. You might need to change privacy settings or restart the app after giving permissions.

Another issue happens when people use different audio devices or have different volume levels. Circleback's AI handles these differences, but very quiet speakers or bad audio quality can hurt transcription accuracy.

Improving transcription accuracy

AI transcription has gotten much better, but technical terms, strong accents, or people talking over each other can create problems.

To get better accuracy, ask people to speak clearly and not talk at the same time. If your team uses lots of industry terms, Circleback's AI will learn them over time and get better at your specific vocabulary.