Microsoft launches StaffHub scheduling app out of preview for Office 365 customers

Microsoft today is announcing the general availability of its StaffHub scheduling app. It’s available on Android, iOS, and the web for customers of Microsoft’s Office 365 K1, E1, E3, and E5 plans.

Microsoft first introduced StaffHub in September, when it began a public preview of the app, pitching it as a way for managers to schedule shifts and send them to employees and a way for employees to get quick access to their schedules. But the app also has file-sharing and messaging functionality, and it provides an easy way for employees to request shift changes, the Office 365 team noted in a blog post.

With its mobile-oriented nature, StaffHub is a good example of the types of apps that Microsoft has been investing in — things that will help lots of people be more productive, even when the apps might not be on top of Microsoft’s own operating systems. That’s also true of other Microsoft Office apps, like Outlook, Word, Excel, and OneNote. And Microsoft has acquired other properties, like MileIQ, SwiftKey, and Wunderlist. The company also recently launched the Teams collaboration app, which has full-featured Android and iOS apps.

Some people have suspected that StaffHub was based in some part on a scheduling app called Shiftr, but in fact StaffHub was produced completely in house and does not draw on technology from any acquisition, a Microsoft spokesperson told VentureBeat in an email.

For eligible Office 365 customers, StaffHub is automatically enabled, and admins can turn it off if they’d like. To use the app, employees and managers must have Office 365 accounts.

Currently, the app is available in 14 languages: Brazilian Portuguese, Chinese (simplified and traditional), Danish, Dutch, English (U.S.), French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.