Organizing and tracking restaurant cleaning schedules with Task Management

The number one priority, of course, is keeping things sanitary to protect the health and safety of your employees. But customers are also paying more attention to restaurant cleanliness than ever before and have become selective about which establishments they choose to order from. In fact, a survey conducted by Bentobox¹ showed that post-COVID restaurant-goers were more concerned about the cleanliness of the establishment than about being in physical contact with servers.

Task Management in 7shifts allows restaurant managers to create, assign, and track digital sanitation checklists to maintain health and safety standards across locations, departments, and shifts.

Things to Know

Before implementing checklists, review these operational guidelines:

• Task Management captures real-time data indicating which employee completed a task, the completion method, and the corresponding timestamp.
• To configure these checklists, managers can use the Task Management setup guide.
• Task lists can be restricted by Location, Department, or Role to ensure relevant distribution to scheduled staff.
• Managers can establish specified Time Frames for lists so employees can monitor upcoming or overdue tasks.
• Employees can submit task verification through multiple completion types including photos, temperature logs, or numerical entries.
• Task Management integrates with any 7shifts subscription plan and can support opening procedures, closing procedures, cash count reminders, and manager to-do lists.

Common Sanitation Tasks

Restaurant operations can utilize these standard sanitation tasks to establish baseline cleaning routines:

• Wipe down, clean, and sanitize all food preparation surfaces.
• Clean the grill, griddle, range, flattop, and fryer.
• Wipe down, clean, and sanitize equipment including toasters, microwaves, and meat slicers.
• Wipe down, clean, and sanitize non-food preparation surfaces including counters, tables, chairs, door handles, light switches, point of sale terminals, and phones.
• Sweep and mop the floors.
• Refill hand sanitizer bottles.
• Clean and sanitize restrooms and refill soap and paper towel dispensers.
• Empty trash and recycling bins.
• Wash aprons, rags, and hats daily.
• Clean and sanitize drive-thru windows if applicable.
• Clean and sanitize delivery vehicles or reusable delivery bags if applicable.

Organizing Task Lists by Location, Department, or Role

Managers can segment sanitation checklists by specific domains to ensure teams receive relevant tasks throughout their shifts.

Location Settings

If an operation runs multiple locations with distinct sanitation needs, managers can assign unique task lists to each separate restaurant location to keep the assignments relevant to local staff.

Department Settings

Task lists can be restricted to specific departments so that only the designated front of house or back of house teams can view and complete them.

Front of house department tasks include sanitizing non-food preparation surfaces, sweeping and mopping floors, refilling hand sanitizer bottles, cleaning restrooms, emptying trash bins, and cleaning drive-thru windows or delivery bags.

Back of house department tasks include sanitizing food preparation surfaces, cleaning grills and fryers, wiping down kitchen equipment, washing garments daily, sweeping and mopping floors, refilling hand sanitizer bottles, and emptying trash bins.

Now, if you pop those task lists into 7tasks, they’d look something like this:

When task lists are assigned to Departments, only the Departments indicated will be able to see the list.

Role Settings

When positions within a single department perform different operational duties, task lists can be divided by specific roles to ensure precise accountability.

Cashiers are responsible for wiping down non-food preparation surfaces, sweeping and mopping floors, refilling hand sanitizer bottles, cleaning restrooms, emptying trash bins, and cleaning drive-thru windows.

Cooks are responsible for cleaning the grill, griddle, range, flattop, and fryer, alongside washing aprons, rags, and hats daily.

Prep Cooks are responsible for wiping down food preparation surfaces, cleaning equipment like toasters or microwaves, and washing aprons, rags, and hats daily.

Dishwashers are responsible for sweeping and mopping floors, refilling hand sanitizer bottles, emptying trash bins, and washing aprons, rags, and hats daily.

Here’s an example of how task lists and individual tasks by Role would look:

Organizing Task Lists by Shift Blocks

Managers can assign identical or similar cleaning tasks to specific shift blocks, such as morning, afternoon, and evening shifts. Naming the task lists after the corresponding employee shift block ensures that employees know exactly which checklist they are responsible for during that day. Setting specified Time Frames for these checklists will alert employees when their tasks are due.

Organizing Task Lists by Time Intervals

The Center for Disease Control (CDC)  recommends that workers disinfect all surfaces regularly. Scheduling recurring tasks every 1 to 2 hours within 7tasks ensures high-traffic areas remain clean throughout the day, and setting task lists for specific times alerts staff to immediate duties.

Next Steps

To maximize accountability, managers can choose to tag a specific task to a scheduled employee or assign an entire checklist to an individual employee.