Which emoji should I use as the approval?

Any single reaction your team agrees on, set by its Slack name, for example thumbsup. Pick one that nobody uses casually in that channel, otherwise a friendly reaction creates a contract by accident.

Can I limit who is allowed to approve?

Yes, and you probably should. Add a filter step after the trigger that only continues when the reacting user is on your list of reviewers. Reactions from anyone else are ignored.

What happens if two people react to the same message?

Each reaction is its own event, so a second thumbs up would create a second contract. A filter limiting approvers to one person or a small group is the usual way to avoid duplicates.

Does removing the reaction undo anything?

No. Once the contract exists in fynk, taking the emoji away changes nothing. Archive or delete the document in fynk if a request was approved by mistake.

Why react instead of just triggering on the message?

Because the reaction adds a person to the loop. Anyone can ask, but a reviewer reads the request and approves it before a contract is drafted, and the channel does not have to be reserved for requests.

Can different emoji create different contracts?

Yes. Build one Zap per emoji, each pointing at its own template, and a single channel can produce NDAs, vendor contracts, or offer letters depending on which reaction someone adds.

Do the people posting requests need fynk accounts?

No. The Zap runs on your fynk connection, so requesters and approvers only need Slack access. That is what lets teams outside Legal use it.

What if someone approves an incomplete request?

The split step returns fewer values than the mapping expects, so a field comes through empty or the run errors. Zap History shows exactly what arrived, and the fix belongs in the message rather than the Zap.

Use cases Create NDA contracts in Slack using emoji

Create NDA contracts in Slack using emoji

A colleague posts the details, a reviewer adds 👍, and the contract is on its way to signature. The reaction is both the approval and the trigger.

Video transcript

Click any line to jump there

Hi and welcome. In this video I'm going to show you how to create a complete contract just by reacting to a message in Slack. To set up this automation you need fynk, Slack, and Zapier to glue these together using a Zap.

So let's get us started. Open fynk and click on this button to create a new template. I'll give it a name and create it and just paste my text here.

Now I have to create two parties for my NDA. One would be the recipient and the other my company. So let's go to the parties and signatories tab. First I would add the recipient. Just give it the name like recipient and save. And now I add another party which is my company as the internal party. And I choose this user to be the signatory as well. By adding a signatory, you can also add the signature block at the end of document by clicking this button.

And if we go back to the document content, we can see that two sets of new fields have been created by fynk. These are the name, address, and signature blocks of each party. So I just drag the signature block of the recipient too and place it next to my own signature block. Then what I'm going to do is to replace these static placeholders with the fields that I just created.

I'm just gonna change the name and address of each party with these fields.

Since I have other placeholder that I need to fill with the Slack message that I'm sending, I'm going to create a dynamic field for each of these values. For example, for the email address, job title, and of course for the restriction period.

Our template is now complete and all we have to do is to publish it.

Now we have everything that we need to set up the automation in Zapier. But before we do that, I need to explain something about the message that you sent in the Slack. So as we saw in the NDA templates, we need several pieces of information that the automation can collect from our Slack message. In this example, we need seven values the person's first name, family name, address, job title, company name, and the confidentiality restriction. Period. And of course their email address. But here's the important thing. You should always keep the values in the same order. For example, if you write the email address and then name and family name, in the next message you should keep the same order. So you cannot first add the name and then email address. This is important because the Zapier doesn't read the message and work out what each line means, it simply counts the lines, separate them and then map out each of these values with a specific dynamic field that we just created in the template. So long story short, always keep the same order for your information. So for now I'm just going to react to this message that I have here and it's time to build the Zap. Go to Zapier and create a new Zap. As a trigger, choose the slack.

As the trigger event, search for reaction and choose new reaction added in a channel.

Make sure your Slack is connected to Zapier and hit continue. In the configure page, choose the channel ID. In this case, I'm going to use NDA. And choose the reaction that you want. I'm going to use thumbs up.

I will find my records and here I have it.

And I just continue with the selected record. So our next step is to split that block of text into seven separate values. So in the next step

Choose Formatter and as an action event choose text. In the next window we have to choose split text here.

We can now choose our input from the previous step, which is text. So I just search for text and choose this one.

As a separator, you can use anything you like, for example comma as a separator, but here I'm going to use the newline and put it between a bracket and a column. And finally as a segment index choose the last option. Which is all as separate fields.

Then we hit continue and test it. You should now see several separate results in the same order as your original Slack message.

Now that we have all the values as separate fields, we can now map the party details. Add a new step and choose fynk as the action app. As the action event, choose Create Document from Template. Make sure your account is connected and in the next step

Choose a name for your document. You can choose something like NDA and then from the previous step choose the family name of your recipient. Then choose the template that you have in fynk, in my case is NDAs. And as you do, all of the fields that need to be mapped out will appear here. And if you scroll down here you can see the dynamic fields that we created and now I'm going to choose from the previous step the correct value for each of these.

So I just go ahead and map these fields. And at the very end, you have this option to move your document to the signing stage. Now we have to test whether this automation works or not. So I just test it out. Now if I open my fynk, you can see the new NDA in my account set on signing already, which means it's now safe to publish our Zap.

Now that our Zap is up and running, let's try the complete workflow once again. So return to the NDA channel in the Slack. I send a new message using new values, but with the same order that we used. I'm just going to react to this message.

Now if we go back to fynk after a few seconds we should be able to see the new NDA. Here's my new NDA completely created only by reacting to a message in a Slack channel. You can also adapt this setup to other types of contracts. Choose a different template and the same workflow could create employment offers, freelancer agreements, or vendor contracts. Thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video.

The goal

Put a human check in front of an automated contract. Anyone can request an NDA in Slack, but nothing is created until a reviewer reacts with a thumbs up. Zapier then reads the approved message and fynk builds the document.

Prepare an NDA template that carries every value the message will supply
Settle on the request format and the emoji that counts as approval
Wire a Zap that listens for the reaction rather than the message

Step 1

Set up the NDA template in fynk

Start a fresh template in fynk and drop in your NDA wording. Then:

Add both sides as parties: the recipient, and your own company internally.
Choose who signs for you and put the signature blocks at the foot of the document.
Swap the fixed details in the text, the recipient’s name and address, for the party fields fynk generated.

Every remaining value the Slack request will supply gets its own dynamic field :

Email address
Job title
Company name
Restriction period

Publish when it is ready, otherwise Zapier cannot select it.

Take one of fynk’s ready-made ones, Mutual NDA or Non-disclosure agreement , and shape the fields around what your team will be posting.

Parties, signatories and dynamic fields in a published fynk NDA template

Step 2

Decide the request format and the approval emoji

Two decisions before you touch Zapier: which emoji means approved, and what a request has to contain. A thumbs up works well because it already reads as a yes in most teams. Each request lists its values one per line, in a fixed order:

First name
Family name
Address
Job title
Company name
Restriction period
Email address

Position is everything here. Zapier does not interpret a line, it hands the first line to the first field, the second to the second, and so on, so a reordered message quietly fills the contract with the wrong values.

NDA requests in a Slack channel, each approved with a thumbs up reaction

Step 3

Build the Zap around the reaction

React to your example message first, so the trigger has something genuine to find. Then open Zapier , create a new Zap, and add three steps:

Slack: New Reaction Added in a Channel. Connect Slack, then on the configure screen choose the channel ID and the reaction itself, thumbs up in this case. Pull in a record and continue with it.
Formatter by Zapier: Split Text. Feed it the text of the approved message, split on the new line, and set the segment index to “All as separate fields”. A test should hand back your seven values in order.
fynk: Create Document From Template. Give the document a name, for example “NDA” plus the recipient’s family name, and select your template. Match every split value to its party field or dynamic field , then enable Move to Signing Stage.

Probably not. The trigger fires whoever adds the reaction, so if approval belongs to specific people, add a filter step after it and continue only when the reacting user is one of them. Everyone else can still react, it simply does nothing.

Open Settings in fynk, go to API integrations, pick fynk API , and generate a token for Zapier. Account owners can create one for you if the menu is not available to you.

Then let the message itself do the triggering. Our guide on how to create NDA contracts from a Slack message uses the same template and formatter, with the posted message as the trigger instead of the reaction.

Step 4

Approve a request and watch it run

Work down the Zap testing each step, then open fynk: the NDA should already be in the signing stage, carrying the values from that message. Confirm each field took the right line, then publish the Zap and leave it switched on.

Now the loop is real. Post a fresh request with new values in the same order, add 👍, and moments later the contract exists in fynk and the signature request is out. Signature tracking shows you where it stands from there.

What makes it fast?

Approval in a single click
Read vital info only before drafting
No approval form, no email thread
A different emoji drives a different contract

"Previously we had to manage contract reviews and approvals via endless email back-and-forth and improvised approval forms, followed by a signing process. If everything needed to be documented, it required a lot of manual filing."

Andrea Schlephorst Corporate Governance Specialist at Falken Tyre Europe

YOU'LL ALSO LIKE

Read all

Smart templates

Fill once. Reuse everywhere.

See all templates

Mutual NDA

Non-disclosure (NDA)

Confidentiality

Vendor service

Employment

Job offer

Frequently asked questions.

Any single reaction your team agrees on, set by its Slack name, for example thumbsup. Pick one that nobody uses casually in that channel, otherwise a friendly reaction creates a contract by accident.
Yes, and you probably should. Add a filter step after the trigger that only continues when the reacting user is on your list of reviewers. Reactions from anyone else are ignored.
Each reaction is its own event, so a second thumbs up would create a second contract. A filter limiting approvers to one person or a small group is the usual way to avoid duplicates.
No. Once the contract exists in fynk, taking the emoji away changes nothing. Archive or delete the document in fynk if a request was approved by mistake.
Because the reaction adds a person to the loop. Anyone can ask, but a reviewer reads the request and approves it before a contract is drafted, and the channel does not have to be reserved for requests.
Yes. Build one Zap per emoji, each pointing at its own template, and a single channel can produce NDAs, vendor contracts, or offer letters depending on which reaction someone adds.
No. The Zap runs on your fynk connection, so requesters and approvers only need Slack access. That is what lets teams outside Legal use it.
The split step returns fewer values than the mapping expects, so a field comes through empty or the run errors. Zap History shows exactly what arrived, and the fix belongs in the message rather than the Zap.