This article explains how to manage existing employee roles in Personio. Follow the steps below when you need to update a role's name and description, change the people assigned to a role, duplicate a role, or delete roles you no longer need.

To create a role for the first time, see Set up employee roles and permissions.

Before you start

• To manage employee roles and permissions, you need an Administrator role. 
• Deleting a role is permanent. Employees in the role lose the permissions it granted them. 
• You cannot add rules to an Administrator role to add employees automatically based on conditions.

Update the details of an employee role

Update a role's name or description to keep it clear for other administrators. For example, after a reorganization changes what the role covers. To update the name or description for an employee role, follow these steps:

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Find the role to update and click the three dots icon > Edit details.
4. Update the role name or description.
5. Save the changes.

Add people to an employee role

Add people to a role when new employees need the same permissions as others in that role, or when you want to include additional people who don’t match the role's existing rules. To add members to an employee role, follow these steps:

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Find the role to update and click the three dots icon > Edit members.
4. In the Add people tab, add or adjust rules to assign employees based on conditions, or select individual people from the dropdown. 
5. Optional: Exclude specific people from the role who otherwise match the rules.
6. Review the Changes tab in the Preview panel to confirm you've added the right employees.
7. Save the changes.

Note: If you set a rule to exclude an attribute, for example, "Department does not contain Sales", the role also includes employees with no value assigned for that attribute, not just those in other departments.

Adjust the rules that automatically add people to an employee role

Update a role's rules when the conditions for membership change, for example, if a role should now apply to a different department or job level. To change the rules that automatically add people to an employee role, follow these steps:

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Select a role from the list, then click Edit > Edit members.
4. In the Add people tab, add, update, or delete rules to update the employees assigned to the role.
5. Review the Changes tab in the Preview panel to confirm you've updated the assigned employees correctly.
6. Save your changes.

Exclude specific employees from an employee role

Use the exclude option when a role's rules would normally include someone, but you want to leave them out without changing the rule itself. For example, excluding a specific person from a role tied to their department.

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Select a role from the list, then click Edit > Edit members.
4. In the Exclude people tab, search for and select the employees to exclude. 
5. Save your changes.

Excluded employees appear under People always excluded. You can re-include someone at any point by returning to these settings and clicking the X next to their name.

Remove people from an employee role

To remove people from a role when they no longer need its permissions, follow these steps:

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Find the role you want to update and click the three dots icon > Edit members.
4. Remove the person depending on how they were added: 
   • In the Add people tab, under People always included, click the X next to their name. To remove all people from this list, click Show all > Remove all.
   • In the Preview panel, click the Members tab. Hover over their status and click Exclude. 
   • In the Exclude people tab, search for and select the people to exclude from the role.
5. Review the Changes tab in the Preview panel to confirm you've removed the right employees.
6. Save the changes.

Administrators can also remove people from a role individually through their employee profile or in bulk using the People List.

Enable admin access for an employee role

Delete an employee role

You can delete roles you no longer need. Deleting a role is permanent and can't be undone. Employees in the role will lose the permissions it granted them.

1. Go to Settings.
2. In the People section, click Roles & permissions.
3. Find the role you want to delete. In the Actions column, click the three-dots icon.
4. Click Delete role.
5. Confirm the deletion.