Meet Your New Product Teammate

The success of projects within a product team depends in part on the technical qualities, skills, and competencies of its members—but above all, on the quality of the decisions made daily. In the end, every project and every product is defined by the accumulation of these decisions over time.

These two components reflect a certain duality. On one hand, we have technical skills and competencies linked to objective and measurable matters in the life of product teams; on the other, the subjective side tied to decision-making.

In this decision-making, the role of the product manager comes into play. Someone always fulfills this function, regardless of team size. The product manager must analyze a large number of inputs in every possible format: listening to customers or users, understanding their problems, grasping the business and its goals, reviewing information scattered across multiple spreadsheets (yes, spreadsheets are still among the best products ever invented), and orchestrating all of this to define courses of action.

Again, we see a duality: a largely creative, subjective, and very human act, yet one that must be fueled by objective and concrete data. These data come from scattered sources and often require repetitive, tedious tasks.

The Value of the Human Factor

The success of projects within a product team depends in part on the technical qualities, skills, and competencies of its members—but above all, on the quality of the decisions made daily. In the end, every project and every product is defined by the accumulation of these decisions over time.

These two components reflect a certain duality. On one hand, we have technical skills and competencies linked to objective and measurable matters in the life of product teams; on the other, the subjective side tied to decision-making.

In this decision-making, the role of the product manager comes into play. Someone always fulfills this function, regardless of team size. The product manager must analyze a large number of inputs in every possible format: listening to customers or users, understanding their problems, grasping the business and its goals, reviewing information scattered across multiple spreadsheets (yes, spreadsheets are still among the best products ever invented), and orchestrating all of this to define courses of action.

Again, we see a duality: a largely creative, subjective, and very human act, yet one that must be fueled by objective and concrete data. These data come from scattered sources and often require repetitive, tedious tasks.

Duster AI Within the Team

Duster AI is specifically designed to help product teams make better decisions and automate repetitive tasks that consume valuable time. It's not about replacing the strategic and creative mindset of a product manager, but rather complementing it with technology that enhances the quality of that work.

Many tasks follow clear rules and can be automated:

• Identifying relevant messages in Slack
• Classifying bug reports
• Intelligently creating issues in Linear
• And much more...

This frees the team to focus on what truly adds value: vision, strategy, and user and client relationships.

By delegating tasks to Duster AI, the team gains space to dive into areas where human intervention is crucial.

Duster AI works by understanding and adapting to your team's context and, as we'll see below, not only analyzes information but also performs customizable, concrete actions. It's your ally in managing subjective, important, and dynamic matters within the wide range of product management challenges.

Integrations and Functionalities

For product teams, Slack remains the communication tool of choice—it's where most of the day is spent, for both internal and external communication. Meanwhile, Linear has become the preferred platform for builders. These tools complement each other naturally, but in practice, they can also generate a lot of noise.

Slack channels multiply, messages pile up, and the list of Linear issues grows with every bug report, feature request, or new idea.

Core Features

Duster AI integrates with Slack and Linear because, for most product teams, these tools are where the action truly happens. Its main features include:

• Omnichannel: You can centralize, filter, and easily find what's happening in Slack and Linear. This omnichannel approach enables a more linear and unified control of everything happening around your product—whether in a growth phase or early validation.

• Filter noise in Slack channels: You can tell Duster what to do with each type of message (e.g., bug reports, feature requests, user feedback, etc.) and transfer the important ones directly to Linear with the data you need.

• Avoid clutter in Linear: Before creating new issues, Duster AI uses semantic search with AI to check if similar issues already exist to avoid duplicates.

• Projects, Teams, and Labels: You can create them in Duster to organize omnichannel information and push them to Linear, or import them from there.

From Duster AI's dashboard, you can view Slack threads and Linear issues in real-time, participate and comment as if you were on those platforms, assign labels, teams, and projects, and create private notes visible only to team members you've invited to Duster.

Duster AI as an Active Agent

Slack messages tend to grow exponentially. Many threads contain important information, while others mention things misaligned with the current product strategy, off-roadmap, or simply unhelpful.

Defining what's important is arbitrary, subjective, and dynamic. Today, you may want feedback on a specific feature; tomorrow, you may need to track a newly discovered critical bug to assess its impact. Everything else becomes "noise."

Good practices—like defining channel rules and purposes—help, but aren't always enough. When wearing the product manager hat, we must ensure we don't miss relevant matters without wasting too much time on secondary ones.

The Boring Engine

To handle this, Duster AI incorporates a customizable workflow engine we call "The Boring Engine"—a playful reference to automating the "boring" and tedious work of managing Slack conversations manually, ensuring nothing important slips through the cracks.

How does a workflow work?

It's simple and powerful:

1. Initial configuration: In the "Message Classification" section of the Dashboard, define what types of messages will trigger an automated flow. This helps Duster understand the channel's purpose, who interacts there, and what messages are important.

   For example, messages in a #bug-reports channel might need platform details, reproduction steps, and priority. The key aspect here is that all configuration is done in natural language—as if you were explaining to a teammate what to focus on and what to do.

2. Slack message received: Whenever someone posts in a configured channel, Duster AI analyzes the new thread against the instructions. If the message is off-topic or considered noise, no action is taken. If it's important, a new workflow is triggered.

3. Analysis and action: With enough information, Duster AI checks if a similar issue exists in Linear (this is the default behavior). If one is found, it adds a comment referencing the Slack thread. If not, it creates a new issue and links it to the original conversation.

Configuration → Message Analysis → Action Decision → Automated Response

If circumstances change and human judgment is needed, the product manager—or any team member—can step in. The flow is transparent and adjustable to the needs of each channel and platform.

Powerful and Adaptable

Duster AI can assist whether you're managing an established product or just starting a new one. With our omnichannel configuration, everything stays centralized, making planning more straightforward.

Duster AI includes preconfigured automations for common use cases like #bug-reports and #feature-request, working exactly as described—turning Slack messages into actionable items in Linear. However, the entire flow is fully adjustable and customizable for any scenario involving user or customer messages.

Key Benefits

• Time savings through automation of repetitive tasks
• Better decision-making with centralized information
• Reduced noise by filtering irrelevant messages
• Seamless integration between Slack and Linear
• Customizable workflows that adapt to your team's needs

Your New Team Member

Duster AI is your partner in ensuring nothing important is lost amid the daily flood of messages and tasks. It allows product teams to focus on the decisions that truly require vision and creativity.

Our goal is to make Duster feel like another team member, optimizing your workflow and ensuring communication between Slack and Linear is smooth, transparent, and automated in a way that is simple, powerful, and adaptable to your changing needs—so that key information flows naturally and is properly managed to always be part of the decision-making process.

If you have questions, we'll be happy to answer them. Write to us at help@useduster.com