7shifts is a restaurant workforce and scheduling management application, which also features collaboration features, from the Canadian company of the same name.
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Trello
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Trello from Atlassian is a project management tool based on a Kanban framework. Trello is ideal for task-management in a to-do list format. It supports sharing boards and cards across users or teams. The product offers a free version, and paid versions add greater automation, collaboration, and administrative control.
7Shifts is ideal for a broad number of restaurant clients, whether it is a single unit, independent location or multi-unit, multi-jurisdiction group like ours. Pricing is very reasonable, and as mentioned earlier, a lightweight and intuitive platform makes it easy to implement and maintain, and scalable for growth
It is well suited to my job requirements as I bring employees in, and I help offboard them as well. This tool helps me when I need to make sure all items are completed by a certain time frame, so I would say it holds us accountable. Someone who doesn't manage a group of people may not find this as useful when dealing with others but could use it for their own accountability when needing to track their accomplishments.
It helps make various workspaces. Each workspace can be used for a different set of task management and can be shared with the people involved.
Creating task lists. We can create various task lists, the list title could be the status of the task, for example, In progress, approval, completed, etc. You can slide your task cards from one list title to another.
Trello cards have a huge set of features like adding the heading and description of the task, you can also attach certain associated links and documents to the cards as well.
When creating schedules I wish there was a way to remember the last schedule you were on instead of ordering them in alphabetical order.
When working on a schedule, again when you revisit it, it alphabetizes the employees instead of keeping them in the order you add them. This is pertinent for our business because we're reservation-based and work off of a rotating schedule where the lowest ones are called off if there are not enough reservations.
Allow tables as content for comment or description in Cards
Assign priority to certain cards (easy for sorting)
Create an open invite link for others to join/view the Trello board, without edit rights (so people don't need to install/use Trello if they want a quick glance on what's going on)
I am very likely to renew Trello, because it doesn't cost anything to do so. I am also very likely to use Trello's upgraded features in the future because a lot of my team's data is stored on there and they have already gotten used to the platform. Trello is very easy for new team members to pick up, making the onboarding and usability very streamlined.
Overall, Trello is a great tool to use. It's very user-friendly, very powerful and we've set it up to work well for our team. I've recommended it to others who need something free or very cheap and it's worked well for them too. If you're wanting something with more muscle, then I'd suggest looking at either monday.com or Airtable.
I would say everyone at our store really appreciates the fact that we have 7shifts. We would be lost with out it. It would be hard to find anyone that does not support the software.
I haven't had much need to contact their support because the product is easy to use and pretty bug-free. I did reach out to them about swimlanes and I was able to find the information I needed very quickly and it was thorough and accurate information about current functionality. I love that they use their own product. That's always a good sign.
For our small business, getting a few of us started well on Trello was the key, I think. As long as a couple of us were really comfortable with the interface, we could lead others and help them with any questions. From now on, anyone who works with us just naturally uses Trello for information sharing - it's just part of what we do.
For me, 7Shifts has the same amount of functionality, but for a much better price. The app functionality of 7shifts was easier to navigate and allowed me to do more than HotSchedules. I've recommended it to several other local businesses who have implemented it as well and had great luck.
Trello is easy for a non-technical person to use. Other management systems, like MS Project, frighten away less computer-savvy users. I've found this to be instrumental in getting volunteers to agree to step in and get fully involved with projects--particularly those that might span the entire year or involve many different pieces to completion.
Positive: Less call outs/ and missed communication due to internal conversations that were never communicated. For example, employees tell manager A they are not coming but Manager A does not tell manage B and C.
Positive: Manager log book has helped multiple departments stay in touch and on the pulse of the floor operation. Departments like HR, events, reservations, AP/ AR, etc. are not empowered to be more proactive
Labor and sales are tracked and can be forecasted which has helps us schedule SMARTER
Trello keeps me organized, focused, and on track. I could filter the Trello board to only see my issues and understand what I needed to work on and when.
Trello helped our team implement an agile structure. It's a very simple kanban method of viewing all of your team's tasks and statuses. You can completely customize the columns to your team's specific workflow and create tags relevant to your work.
Trello helps reduce unnecessary communications between teams. When I want to request translations, I simply create a card on the localization Trello board -- no need to directly message anyone on the team, and I can watch the status of the card change from "in progress" to "in review" to "translated," all without having to directly ask for updates.
