🔓 Access level in Planday: Administrator or HR Manager with access to all departments in Planday.

🌐Subscription plan: Plus, Pro.

⏱️ Reading time: 3 min.

⏱️ Setup time: 10 min

ℹ️ Important read: Personio integration – FAQs and Troubleshooting

✅ Required steps: Employee management in Planday explained

Key functionalities of the Personio integration:

Syncs new employees
Updates employee profiles
Creates or maps employee groups
Creates or maps departments
Deactivates terminated employees
Imports approved leave

Step 1: Setting up the integration in Personio

Navigate:
1. In Personio, navigate to Marketplace.
2. Click on the Connected integrations tab.
3. Click on the Create custom integration button.
Set-up:
1. Enter Planday or another appropriate integration name.
2. Click next.
3. Configure access - ensure that the following access is given:

Check Access Rights

Attribute	Read	Write
Employees	Enabled
Attendance	Enabled
Time Off	Enabled
Documents
Custom Reports
Recruiting
Webhooks	Enabled	Enabled
Org Units	Enabled
Legal Entities
Cost Centres
Workplaces

Note: Employee Attributes and Legal Entities are set to Select All or customized depending on the selected scopes in step 2 below. Complete Step 1 and 2 below and follow the guide that will specify exactly what access is required based on your set scopes.

3. Done: Copy ClientID and API secret.

You’re now ready to go and set-up the integration in Planday.

Head over to your Planday workspace and log in as an Administrator/HR Manager with access to all departments.

Step 2: Complete the setup in Planday

Set-up:
You can connect an HR integration from any of these pages in Planday:
- Planday-Web > Settings > Integrations > Overview > Personio > Set up (Admin only)
- Planday-Web > People Employees > Create employees > Connect with HR system (Admin + HR Manager)
Set scopes: Choose whether you want to disable any optional scopes (such as pay rates if you don't want to transfer salaries)
Authenticate: Enter your Personio API credentials. Paste the Client ID and API Secret you generated from your Personio account into the respective fields.
Configure Filter: Choose which filters to apply.
Review and Confirm: Review the data to be synced and click connect.

Required Fields: If your Planday workspace contains mandatory fields, the import cannot proceed. The system will display a message prompting you to mark these fields as "Optional/Non required" in Planday.

Note that the Gender field is an exception and will be archived instead. If you do not update the required fields, the import will fail.

See the following articles for more information:

Once you confirm your filters, the onboarding wizard will launch. Continue with the steps below.

Step 3: Onboarding wizard: flexible entity mapping

After connecting and filtering, a guided wizard walks you through how your Personio data maps into Planday. This replaces the previous automatic-only mapping and gives you direct control over your data structure.

Wizard step 1 — Configure entity mapping

Choose how each Personio entity type maps to Planday:

Personio entity	Can map to
Departments	Planday Departments, Planday Employee Groups, or skip
Teams	Planday Departments, Planday Employee Groups, or skip
Work locations	Planday Departments, or skip
Positions / job titles	Planday Employee Groups, or skip

Note: If all entity mappings are skipped, the integration will create one default department and one default employee group automatically.

Wizard step 2 — Map departments

Review which Personio entities will create or update departments in Planday. Confirm or adjust the assignments before continuing.

Wizard step 3 — Map employee groups

Review which Personio entities will be used to assign employees to groups in Planday. Confirm or adjust the assignments.

Wizard step 4 — Configure absence and employee settings

Choose whether to enable the automatic import of approved absence data from Personio.
Choose whether new employees added through the integration should automatically receive an invite email to Planday.

Wizard step 5 — Review and confirm

Review all your configuration choices. Once you confirm, the integration status moves to pending and the first full sync begins. The integration is marked as complete once the initial sync finishes.

Data mapping between Personio and Planday

Standard fields are mapped automatically. The table below shows the default field-to-field mapping.

Personio fields that Planday map

Personio Field	Planday
First name (legal)	First Name
Last name (legal)	Surname
Email	Email (username)
Date of birth	Birthday
Hire date	Hire date
Termination Date	Termination date
Profile Picture	Profile Picture
Department	Customized based on user setting
Team	Customized based on user setting
Work Location	Customized based on user setting
Position	Customized based on user setting
Address	Address
City	City
Postcode	Postcode

Note: Mapping of custom fields is not supported in this integration.

Mapping Logic - Department mapping

Planday maps Departments and Employee Groups from Personio based on the entity assignments you configured in the wizard.

Note: Planday Departments and Employee Groups are only created for groups that contain employees currently being imported.

Key Functionality & Data Sync

How to import employees from Personio to Planday

The Personio integration is designed to be a "single source of truth" system, where Personio manages all employee data, which is then synced to Planday.

Prevents Data Duplication

The integration uses persistent external IDs to link profiles between the Personio and Planday, which prevents the creation of duplicate employees if data is changed in Planday - but not in Personio. An employee is mapped on the email when the sync happens - but even if the email is changed following the original link being created - the ID will persist and the email will be overwritten in Planday to match that of Personio.

One-Way Data Sync

Data flows one-way from Personio to Planday. Any manual changes made to synced employee fields within Planday will be overwritten during the next sync to maintain data integrity.

Note: There’s one exception to this which is the email (username) in Planday. Email changes must be made directly in Planday.

Sync Frequency

The integration automatically syncs data every three hours. A manual "Sync now" button is also available in the integration settings.

Note: The automatic sync is a partial sync (only syncs changes), whereas the “sync now” option is a full sync. If data is not transferred try to complete a manual sync before reaching out to support.

Filtering

You can select specific departments, locations, employment types etc. from Personio to sync. The filtering is done when the integration is set-up.
To change filters, you need to disable the integration and re-enable it.
You can deactivate and then reactivate the integration, without loosing the existing links - eg. filters and mapping will be saved.

Reconnecting the Integration (Data Link Loss)

When the integration is deactivated, existing links are preserved for up to 90 days before being permanently removed. Reconnecting within this window reduces the risk of data loss. After the 90-day period, all prior links are permanently deleted.

Why does this cause duplicates?

This loss of links becomes critical when the primary identifier (e.g. Email/Username) has been changed in Personio but has not yet been updated in Planday.

Since the Email in Planday is an exception to the One-Way Data Sync rule, the email change in Personio will not automatically update the corresponding Planday profile. If the integration is deactivated and reactivated in this state, the system will not recognize the profiles as the same user and will re-create the user as a duplicate in Planday.

How to import leave data from Personio to Planday

When Absence Sync is enabled for your Personio integration, approved leave recorded in Personio is automatically imported into Planday. Personio remains the single source of truth for all absence data; Planday simply reflects what has been approved in Personio.

How leave is displayed in the schedule

Visual leave indicators: Approved absences from Personio are shown on the schedule as a leave bar (blue bar) so managers can quickly see when an employee is unavailable.
Existing shifts are left as is: If an employee already has a shift in Planday on a day where Personio reports approved leave, that shift is either not automatically converted to an Open Shift or left as is, depending on the integration setting. The setting can be updated by going to Planday Web > Settings > Overview > Personio > Set up.
Approved leave only: Only approved absences from Personio are synced into Planday; pending absences are ignored.

Handling of partial leave days

A note will be added to the leave in Planday clarifying that the employee is off for only part of the day.

Personio leave configuration

Direction of sync: Leave sync is one-way (Personio to Planday). All accruals, approvals and policy checks happen in Personio.
Enable/disable: Leave Sync is controlled via a toggle in the integration settings, and each imported absence event is logged in the Integration Sync Log for traceability. Leave sync is on by default.

Personio integration - Setup guide with Planday