This article explains the Employee profile and Employment details permission groups and what each one controls. Use it as a reference when you set up or manage roles and permissions in your account.
See the Overview of permissions and roles to learn how they work within Personio.
Employee profile
This group controls access to each subsection in the Personal Information tab of the employee profile. This includes standard sections like Public profile and HR information and any custom sections your organization creates.
For each subsection, you can set an access level (View, Propose, or Edit) and assign an access scope (Self, Reporting line, All, or Custom) to define which employees the access applies to.
Requirements
Keep these core requirements and dependencies in mind before setting individual section permissions:
- People list access: To see other employees in the People list, users need View permission for at least one profile section. If not, the People list appears empty.
- Non-Active employee visibility: To see employees in Onboarding, Leave, or Inactive statuses, users need View permission for the profile section that contains the Status attribute.
- Termination date visibility: The termination date is linked to the Status attribute. Any user who can view the profile section containing the Status attribute can also see termination dates for employees who have been terminated.
- Propose permissions and approvals: If you grant Propose permissions without an active approval rule in place, change requests are approved automatically. Always check that an approval rule exists for that employee data change first.
Public profile
The Public profile permission controls whether users can search for colleagues and view or manage their basic employee details in Personio.
Use this permission to grant access to:
- The Personal Information tab in the employee profile. This includes employee profile pictures, last login date, email invitation status, and any attributes this section contains. All employees can change their own profile picture, and you can’t restrict this. To change other employees’ profile pictures, you need Edit access to Public profile for those employees.
- The About tab in the employee profile. The visible information depends on the profile sections users have permission for.
- Finding employees with an Active status using the People list, search bar, and Org chart.
The table below explains what a user can do depending on the level of permission granted:
| Level | What users can do |
|---|---|
| View | View attributes in this section, profile pictures, last login dates, and email invitation statuses for the selected scope of employees. |
| Propose | View attributes in this section and submit requests to change them for the selected scope of employees. Changes require approval before they're applied. |
| Edit | Directly change and update attributes in this section for the selected scope of employees without requiring approval. |
Dependencies:
To ensure users can perform tasks as expected, keep the following in mind:
- To see employees in the Org chart, users need a minimum of View permission for Public profile.
- Most employees need permission for Public profile to complete daily tasks, so only store non-sensitive information in this section. For example: Preferred name, Position, Workplace, Department, and Supervisor.
- If you place the Status attribute in this profile section, all users with this permission can see an employee's Termination date.
HR Information
This permission controls access to the HR Information subsection and the attributes it contains. This section usually includes attributes related to standard HR details like Gender, Employee ID, Cost center. The exact attributes in this section depend on how your organization has configured the employee profile.
Custom section
Every custom profile section you create in Personal information settings appears as its own permission in this group. You need to set the access level and scope for each custom section individually.
Employment details
The Employment details permission group controls access to employee data, history records, onboarding and offboarding workflows, and employee management configurations in Personio.
Assigning roles to employees
The Assigning roles to employees permission controls access to manage user roles within individual employee profiles under the Roles tab.
When enabled, users can add and remove user roles on individual employee profiles, except for the Administrator role.
Note: Only existing Administrators can assign or remove the Administrator role. You must also be an Administrator to assign or remove roles for multiple people in the People list.
Delete employee profile
This permission controls access to permanently remove employee profiles from Personio.
When enabled, users can permanently delete an employee profile along with all associated data, including time off history, uploaded documents, and historical profile records.
Employee history overview
The Employee history overview permission controls access to the History tab in the employee profile. This tab shows a record of all changes made to an employee's attributes. For example, updates to someone's salary, position, department, etc.
To see more details about the changes, users need permission for Employee history - Details.
Employee history - Details
The Employee history - Details permission controls access to the Detail view in the History tab. Users also need permission for the Employee history overview.
The table below explains what a user can do depending on the level of permission granted:
| Level | What users can do |
|---|---|
| View |
|
| Edit |
|
Employee notes
The Employee notes permission controls access to the Notes tab in the employee profile.
The table below explains what a user can do depending on the level of permission granted:
| Level | What users can do |
|---|---|
| View | See the Notes tab in an employee’s profile and read all the notes within it. |
| Edit | See the Notes tab in an employee’s profile, read all notes, and add or delete notes within it. |
Job families, Job tracks, and Job levels
These permissions control whether configured job architecture details appear next to the Job Name attribute in an employee's profile (Job families, Job tracks, and Job levels).
To edit a Job Family, Job Track, or Job Level through an employee's profile, users need:
- Edit permission for the profile section containing the Job Name attribute.
- Minimum View permission for Job Architecture & Catalog.
Onboarding/Offboarding
The Onboarding/Offboarding permission controls access to the Onboarding and Offboarding tabs in the employee profile. By default, employees can always view and complete their own assigned tasks.
The table below explains what a user can do depending on the level of permission granted:
| Level | What users can do |
|---|---|
| View | View all onboarding/offboarding steps from assigned templates and send related emails. |
| Edit | Assign, edit, and delete on/offboarding steps from assigned templates. |
Dependencies:
- To see employees who are still onboarding before their hire date, users need View permission for the profile section containing the Status attribute.
- Assigning an onboarding or offboarding step to a user automatically gives anyone with access to the Onboarding or Offboarding tab limited temporary access. They can view or update the data tied directly to that step and view the employee's profile header, regardless of standard permission restrictions.
Create employee profile or rehire
The Create employee profile or rehire permission controls whether users can add new employee profiles or reactivate former team members.
When enabled, users can create new employee profiles using the Add employee button in the People list or use the Rehire this person option on inactive or terminated profiles.
Import - Employee data import
This permission controls access to Import employee data into Personio. To import employee data, users also need:
- Edit permission for the profile sections they need to update for the relevant scope of employees.
- Edit permission for Create employee profile or rehire if they want to create new employees using the import.
Learn more about import permissions.
People list & org chart (export)
This permission controls the ability to export data directly from the People list and Org chart.
Note:
Users can only export data and attributes that their assigned roles have permission to view.
View Archived Attributes
This permission controls whether users can view historical attributes that have been archived within the Personal Information tab. Users can only see archived attributes if they have View permissions for the profile sections those attributes originally belonged to.