Just to check that we are on the same page: when we say "threaded conversation", be we both mean the ability to visually group the messages in the conversation in hierarchical trees[0], right? Because I don't recall ever seeing anything like that in Slack, nor being taught how to do that. I haven't used it in quite a while though.
Even if it is there, the affordances of the UI[1] don't seem to encourage this style of conversation. There is a huge difference between something being theoretically possible for expert users, or intuitively embedded it in the mode of conversation.
Mind you, I'm not saying that hierarchical trees are a panacea. I think human conversation is much more similar to the way branching and merging works in distributed version control systems, but I can't see how one would easily make a conversational UI based on that.
I think that Slack's implementation of threaded conversations is severely lacking. It's easy to miss that someone has replied to you and started a thread, and it's hard to find existing threads, you have to scroll up in history and try and find it.
Slack threads almost got me fired. Long story short: I requested leave for a couple of days, by posting in the #leave channel on the company slack, as is company policy. A week later I was sick and took a day off work, that same day my boss (who works remote to the rest of the team and was separate to my supervisor) denied my request, by posting a reply and starting a thread on slack. The next day, when I came into work, my Slack was filled with unread messages and comments. I checked my DMs, and just marked everything else as read since it was mostly people mentioning @channel. Because I only checked my DMs I missed this reply to my request for leave. I only discovered the day before I was due to leave that my request was denied, when one of my colleagues mentioned it to me. I then proceeded to go on leave, which work wasn't too pleased about. I was basically asked to resign, which I did because I was planning on leaving the company anyway.
There were a few problems caused by slack here (as well as my own failings).
Slack has too much noise. After only a day away, I was inundated with messages, and no easy way to sort the wheat from the chaff. This can be mitigated by good management and company policy. Using @channel to chat about your plans for the weekend is not appropriate use of @channel.
With email, I would've gotten a nice list of unread emails, which I could scan down and automatically delete the ones I don't care about, and I would've clearly seen the email titled "re: leave request". Slack DMs also lack any kind of subjects or threads, so it's not possible to send leave requests to a manager with a subject heading, if company policy required me to put leave requests in as a DM, it would sit in a single threaded conversation with my boss along with all my other messages.
I think that slack is a good tool if used properly and appropriately. @all or @here should be used sparingly, and for important messages. DMs shouldn't be used for anything serious. It shouldn't be company policy to have a #leave channel where you post your leave requests, where your boss can publicly second guess your requests for sick leave. It all comes down to how its used. Slack is great if I need to send a quick message to a colleague, or if I need to post a comment in a channel where a prompt reply isn't required.
Slack does try to advertise itself as an alternative to email though, which is BS. It's a tool to use beside email. It's just like how IRC didn't replace email, neither did Skype.
First that a company would deny a vacation request. Vacation is something that you schedule with your manager, not that you ask for. It's vacation. Of course you're going. You're just letting them know when.
Second that anybody would try to have such an obvious email conversation over slack. That doesn't seem like a good use for group chat. For the reason you describe.
It never struck me as good company policy to have all leave requests in a public channel visible to all company employees.
I think that this solution came about because the company had a very strong dislike of email for some reason. All support was done using Intercom.io, rather than email and all company communications were done in Slack. I don't think I sent a single email in the 2 years I worked there.
Being able to create a direct message with a topic would've been the ideal solution, which is literally what email is.
It's perfectly normal for companies to deny leave requests, especially smaller ones.
One common reason is simply boots on the ground, can't have everyone take the same day off. Deadlines, if I ask for leave in the last week before a deadline.
You might be thinking from a programming perspective but imagine your whole support team taking the same two weeks off.
There are loads of reasonable, practical, reasons to deny leave. Every company policy in the UK will usually clearly state don't book tickets, etc. until approval.
Vaguely related, here in the UK there are people who get a bad rep for being greedy by blocking off certain holiday before other people as soon as the year gets 'released' e.g. booking every Friday before a bank holiday Monday off, so no-one else can. Good managers will shut down that behaviour and tell them they can only take X of them, as it causes resentments.
