How to Convince Your Manager You Need Restaurant Scheduling Software

Odds are, if you’re reading this, you’ve already discovered all the ways restaurant scheduling software can ease daily headaches in your restaurant’s operations. After all, you’re likely the one in the trenches, spending hours pouring over spreadsheets, accommodating endless shift change requests, and scrambling to save the day when an employee doesn’t show up for a shift.

While it’s clear to you how a software-based solution like 7shifts can help, you still need to win over your manager (and maybe even your manager’s boss) before anyone will feel those benefits.

So, how can you convince them?

Why You Need Restaurant Scheduling Software

Make your case compelling by highlighting the software benefits that resonate the most with how your manager makes decisions:

Money Motivates

Most managers can be convinced to adopt a new software if it has positive return on investment. Show them that it’s definitely worth the price tag by outlining key tangible benefits of using the software.

For one, 7shifts’ labor cost savings calculator allows users to see how much is being spent on staff on a daily and weekly basis in real time. In addition, its integration with POS means users can schedule the exact needed number of staff based on forecasted sales. That means that by using 7shifts, your restaurant can save 1–3% on labor costs by ensuring that scheduling coverage is optimized and in proportion with your budget and sales.

Your restaurant can save 1–3% on labor costs by ensuring that scheduling coverage is optimized in proportion to your budget and sales.

If you live in a state with highly-regulated labor compliance (California, Colorado, Kentucky, Minnesota, Nevada, Vermont, and Washington), 7shifts has built-in checks for overtime and required breaks. Such automated oversight can save restaurant owners thousands of dollars in lawsuits by ensuring that employees take proper, scheduled breaks—paid or unpaid—in accordance with the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).

Time-Conscious

If efficiency is a primary motivator for your manager, scheduling software like 7shifts will be a very easy sell. Managers typically spend hours creating – and tweaking – spreadsheets of staff schedules and sorting through all manner of communication to field shift change requests.

7shifts can streamline those tasks into just a few clicks. Schedules are created online and can be copied, or easily adjusted, from week to week. Staff can also use the 7shifts app to request and swap shifts, which managers can approve with a click on the app. With the hours saved on schedules, managers can redirect their time and energy towards improving other segments of the restaurant operation.

Entice managers with multiple locations to 7shifts by citing the benefits of its Enterprise Dashboard, which permits scheduling and real-time labor data across numerous locations. There’s no need to visit each site or seek out managers to make labor decisions by location or operation-wide.

(And if your spreadsheet-loving manager needs more convincing, you can share that Excel is considered so inefficient that Forbes once referred to it as “the most dangerous software on the planet!”)

Big-Hearted

Considering how chaotic restaurant scheduling can be, it’s no wonder staff are often frustrated with how their schedules are communicated and how their time-off requests are handled. Managers who treat their staff more like family than employees may be persuaded by 7shifts’ ability to grant employees a better work/life balance, ultimately improving retention rates and fostering a happier workforce.

With scheduling software, schedules can easily be made two weeks in advance, giving employees the chance to plan how they spend their time away from work. As part of its labor compliance features, 7shifts also has built-in alerts to avoid staff working consecutive closing and opening shifts without a break. What’s more, employee’s time-off requests are submitted and approved through 7shifts, which means that they won’t get lost in the shuffle and can be factored in well in advance.

Now that you’ve made your case of why your restaurant needs scheduling software, let your manager see how easy 7shifts is to use by starting a free trial today.

Amanda McCorquodale

Amanda McCorquodale is freelance writer based in White Plains, NY.