In a recent interview, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, voiced sharp criticism of workplace messaging and collaboration app Slack, describing it as generating “fake work” and suggesting that a new class of AI-native productivity tools may soon replace not only Slack but also email, docs and other office software.
“I suspect there is something new to build that will replace much of the current office productivity suite, including docs, slides, email, and Slack, with an AI-driven version of these tools,” he said.
Backing Altman’s remarks, Glean CEO Arvind Jain said the problem is getting worse because AI often operates without full context. “When AI only sees one slice of the work, one task turns into five,” he wrote on X.
Jain explained that partial automation creates new coordination burdens. AI might answer a status question in chat instead of updating the tracker, leaving behind a long thread, an outdated system, and a reconciliation task later. It might also draft a document without the current spec or approver, leading to rework, endless comments, and yet another “sync to align” meeting.
In other cases, AI opens duplicate tickets for issues already fixed upstream, forcing teams into extra triage and cleanup.
Natasha Malpani, founder of Boundless Ventures, argued that the real problem isn’t Slack or AI but how people have mistaken talking for work. “Group chat was built for talk. Work needs movement,” she said, adding that layering AI on top of existing tools doesn’t solve the issue. “It just summarises the noise.”
Instead of simply “adding AI to chat,” she suggested rethinking coordination itself. In her view, humans and AI agents shouldn’t be messaging each other at all; instead, they should act from a shared, real-time source of truth.
According to her, conversations should branch, not scroll, and context should compound, not disappear.
Kunwar Raj, founder of SuperPen, told AIM that the real issue isn’t Slack or any particular tool but how people use them. Most of these platforms, he said, were designed for coordination, not concentration.
“I use both WhatsApp and Slack to communicate with my team and clients, and I’ve realised most of my day can easily disappear into notifications and quick replies,” Raj told AIM. “It gives the illusion of being productive because you’re always doing something, but rarely moving the needle forward.”
While AI-powered summaries and prioritisation sound helpful in theory, Raj said they often fall short in practice, especially when dealing with high-value clients or sensitive relationships. “It’s hard to trust an algorithm to interpret tone, intent, or nuance,” he said.
What would truly make these tools useful, he added, is context awareness. “Something that knows what actually deserves my attention versus what can wait,” he said. “Until then, the only real fix is discipline.”
When AI Actually Helps
However, adding AI features to existing apps isn’t entirely pointless. A global tech employee told AIM that their organisation uses Microsoft’s suite of products, which they say has improved productivity. They added that they often use AI tools to summarise text and draft emails.
Notably, Microsoft recently launched Agent Mode in Excel and Word and Office Agent in Copilot chat, introducing what the company calls “vibe working” to Microsoft 365 Copilot. The features are designed to help users create spreadsheets, documents, and presentations through iterative, prompt-based collaboration with AI.
Coming back to Slack, the platform is also adding agentic capabilities. Himanshu Rajpal, regional sales director, Salesforce India, told AIM that Slack will now serve as the conversational interface for Salesforce, with new integrations for Agentforce Sales, IT, HR Service, and Tableau. Teams can interact with CRM data and agents through natural language “right in the flow of work.”
Slack’s updated Agentforce Sales lets sales teams manage customer records and pipelines directly in Slack without toggling between tools. Agentforce IT Service and HR Service bring instant AI support for common employee requests, while Agentforce Tableau embeds live dashboards into conversations.
“Teams, people, employees, stakeholders really are getting tired of switching between apps, changing context, and toggling between different tools all the time. They need to be able to drive quick decision-making through a singular interface,” said Rajpal.
Meanwhile, Altman’s comments possibly foreshadow that OpenAI plans to launch an enterprise product, one that could compete with Slack and Microsoft.
Notably, his remarks drew a reaction from Elon Musk, who posted on X, “As I was saying, OpenAI will compete directly with Microsoft.” He added, “At this point, it’s insanely suicidal for Microsoft to continue supporting OpenAI.”
The post The Rise of ‘Fake Work’ at Big Tech appeared first on Analytics India Magazine.
