Dash Connectors Setup Guide

Dash Connectors let Dash use tools from the external services your team already works in (such as Slack, Google Drive, GitHub, Linear, HubSpot, and Microsoft services) right alongside your GovDash data. This guide covers how team admins make connectors available to their team.

How To Guide
If you’re an end user looking to connect your accounts and use connectors in Dash, see our Using Dash Connectors article.

Important: Connectors and CUI
When Dash uses a connector, requests leave the GovDash authorization boundary and go to the external provider.
Connectors never work with CUI. Dash will not send CUI to a connector, and connectors are not available in CUI contexts.
Only enable connectors for providers your organization has approved for non-CUI business data.

Overview

There are two types of Dash Connectors:

Native connectors are built-in providers such as Slack, Google Drive, GitHub, Linear, HubSpot, and Microsoft services. An admin enables a provider for the team, then each user connects their own account through that provider’s sign-in flow.
Custom connectors are MCP (Model Context Protocol) endpoints your team manages, configured with a URL and headers. They are team-owned, users do not sign in individually.

Responsibilities split cleanly between admins and users: admins control which connectors are available to the team, and each user controls which available connectors are active in their own Dash conversations.

Permissions

Enabling native connectors and managing custom connectors requires the Manage Team Integrations permission.
Regular users can connect their own accounts for enabled native connectors and choose which available connectors are active in their Dash conversations.
Regular users cannot create, edit, delete, or disconnect team-owned custom connectors.

Enable a native connector

Login to GovDash (dashboard.govdash.us).
Go to Settings > Configurations > Integrations and scroll to Dash Connectors.
Under Native Connectors, find the provider you want to make available.
Click Enable.

The provider is now available to everyone on your team. Users will see it listed in their Connectors menu in Dash, where they can connect their own account.

A few things to know:

Enabling a native connector does not connect any user accounts. Each user still completes the provider’s sign-in flow before Dash can act on their behalf, using their own permissions in that tool.
You can disable a provider at any time from the same page. Disabling affects the whole team, the provider is removed from every user’s available connectors.
Providers marked Coming soon cannot be enabled yet.
Microsoft connectors (such as Outlook, Microsoft Calendar, Microsoft Teams, Word, and SharePoint) require your team’s Microsoft tenant to be linked. See our Microsoft integration documentation for tenant setup.

Set up a custom connector

Custom connectors let you point Dash at any MCP server your team runs or subscribes to — for example, an internal tool or a vendor that exposes an MCP endpoint.

Go to Settings > Configurations > Integrations and scroll to Dash Connectors.
Under Custom Connectors, click Add new.
Enter a name for the connector. This is what your team will see in their Connectors menu.
Enter the Config JSON with the server URL and any headers. Headers typically carry secrets such as an API token or bearer authorization. For example:

{
"url": "https://mcp.example.com/mcp",
"headers": {
"Authorization": "Bearer token-value"
}
}

Click Save.

When you save, GovDash validates the connector by opening the MCP server and listing its tools. If validation succeeds, you’ll see a success message with the number of tools found, and the connector appears in your Custom Connectors list. If validation fails, the connector is not saved — see Troubleshooting below.