How to create Lessons for Employee Training
Lessons are the individual building blocks of a 7shifts Employee Training Course and can be created manually or generated using AI tools.
7shifts Employee Training is now available on the Premium plan! Admins and Managers can still create Lessons and Courses, but publishing, assigning, and other key actions require a Premium plan. You'll be prompted to upgrade when you hit one of these actions. Employees will no longer have access to Training on web or mobile until the account upgrades. All content and progress data is preserved, and once you're on Premium, you and your team can pick up right where you left off.
Things to Know
Important: Managers and Assistant Managers require the permission "Can manage training" to create and manage content and "Can view training" to view courses, approve tasks, and access training reporting.
- Employees must complete lessons in the specific sequence set by the manager.
- Training is built and managed on the 7shifts web app, while employees complete their assigned courses through the 7shifts mobile app.
- You can save time by using AI to instantly convert existing PDFs/Docs or text prompts into structured lessons and quizzes. AI-generated content should be reviewed for accuracy before publishing.
- Editing a lesson will automatically update it across all courses where it is currently used.
Creating Lessons with AI
Managers can use the AI-powered lesson builder to create course content quickly without starting from scratch. 7shifts offers two primary AI methods:
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Document Upload: Upload a PDF or DOCX file (up to 10MB) to transform your materials into engaging, custom lesson pages and quizzes. The AI may also pull graphics from your file to include in your new lesson.
Tip: If you have a resource that you would like the team to be able to view as-is, upload it to the Resource Library for employees to access on the mobile app.
- Text Prompts: Enter a specific prompt, such as "Create a lesson on safe food handling," and the AI will generate the instructional text complete with content and quizzes.
Creating Lessons Manually
To create lessons manually, select +Create Lesson within the Lesson Library and choose Start from Scratch.
Once your in the lesson content builder, you can manually add your sections, content, quizzes and acknowledgements.
- Mixed Content pages provide a flexible layout for adding text instructions, images, and video files.
- Quiz pages allow you to create multiple-choice, ordering, matching, or short answer questions.
- Acknowledgement pages are a formal verifications requiring users to confirm they have read and understood a policy or document.
Tip: To change the order of your pages, click and hold the six-dot icon (⋮⋮) next to the page name and drag it to your preferred position.
Quiz question types
When adding a quiz page to your lesson, you'll choose a quiz type before building it.
Note: The question type can't be changed after creation, so you'll need to delete and re-add the question to switch types.
Below are the available quiz types:
Employees select the correct answer(s) from a list of options.
Tip: You can use this quiz type to create true/false questions.
When building a multiple choice question:
- Set the Answer type to either Single answer or Multiple answers depending on how many correct answers exist.
- Enter your answer options in the Options fields.
- Select the indicator to the right of each correct option under Mark the correct answer.
After submission, correct answers turn green and incorrect answers turn red.
Employees tap an item in the left column and then tap its correct match in the right column. A number badge confirms each pair is linked. Tapping a paired item again undoes it. All pairs must be completed before employees can submit their answers.
When building a matching question:
- Create up to 8 match pairs (minimum 2 required).
- The right column will be automatically shuffled for every employee.
- Tip: 4 to 6 pairs work best on mobile.
After submission, correct pairs turn green, and incorrect pairs turn red.
Employees drag and drop steps into the correct sequence.
When building an ordering question:
- Create up to 8 steps (minimum 2 required) and arrange in the correct top-to-bottom order.
- Steps will be automatically shuffled for every employee.
After submission, correct order placement pairs turn green, and incorrect placements turn red.
Employees type a written response in their own words. A manager reviews and grades these manually — they're not auto-graded.
Note: An employee's course progress won't be blocked while their answer is awaiting review.
When building a short answer question:
- Enter your question and, optionally, add question details to give employees more context.
- Adjust the character limit between 20–500 characters (default is 280).
- Optionally, add a rubric describing what a correct answer should include. Only managers can see it — employees won't.
To grade a short answer response:
When a short answer needs grading, the Manager assigned to the same Location and Department as the employee will get an email notification.
They can click Grade Answer to go directly to the employee's course, or follow these steps:
- Go to Training and click on the course you want to grade.
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Click the Tracking and Reports tab, set filter to Needs grading and select the employee's name.
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Click Grade next to the short answer question with the status Needs Grading.
- Review their answer against the rubric, and select Correct or Incorrect.
Note:
The rubric will only populate if details were added when the quiz was created.
Employees do not receive submitted feedback at this time.
Adding and Editing Media
You can add media up to 500MB on any Content page. Supported file types include images (.png, .jpg, .jpeg, .gif, .webp, .svg), videos (.mp4, .webm, .mov), PDFs (.pdf), YouTube links, and Vimeo links.
Tip: Images display best on the mobile app at a 4:3 aspect ratio with a minimum size of 750×560 pixels.
- In the Lesson content builder, select the page you want to edit from the left-hand navigation.
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To add or edit media, click the pencil icon in the top-right corner of the media block, select your file, and click Add Media.
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To remove media, click the trash icon on the media block.
App Preview
As you build or edit your lesson, you can visualize exactly how your content will look to your team.
- The App Preview panel on the right side of the lesson screen automatically updates to reflect your changes, showing you a live mock-up of the mobile app interface.
- Click the Preview button (represented by the eye icon at the top of the page) to see an interactive, full-screen rendering of how employees will progress through pages, view media, and complete quizzes on their mobile devices.
Next Steps
After creating your lessons, you can build out your Training Course and assign them to your team!