Permission Roles for User and User Groups
You use roles and their scope to determine who in your organization is authorized to view or edit absences, weekly working hours, and time tracking.
Roles define what users and user groups in your organization are allowed to do. Each assignment consists of three parts:
User/Group (who has the role) → Role → Applies to (who it affects)
You determine the scope via Applies to: The group All Internal Users includes all users, while a single user group includes only its members. For example, a department head can only view the working hours of their own department.
This Applies to All Roles
- A role applies exclusively to the users listed under Applies to.
- Every user can always view their own data, regardless of any roles. Roles only govern access to others’ data.
- Read-only roles do not allow editing.
Who typically receives these roles?
In practice, the following applies to roles related to absences, weekly working hours, and time tracking:
- Smaller organizations: management or a designated person, each with access to all users.
- Medium and large organizations: the HR department. If HR is divided by location or department, each person receives the role only for their own user group.
Work time or project time?
Octaved Flow distinguishes between two types of time:
- Time tracking → pure attendance.
- Project time tracking → time allocated to projects.
The two may be identical, but they do not have to be.
Presence and Absence
Presence and absence records are required for calculating scheduled working hours and are also factored into resource planning. It is therefore always advisable to enter this information, even if your organization does not use time tracking.
Manage Absences
Where: Settings → Attendance and Absences
Enter attendance and absences, such as vacation and sick days. This also includes viewing vacation days, as well as editing vacation entitlement and carrying it over to the following year.
View Absences with Details and Vacation Days
Where: Settings → Attendance and Absences
Displays sick days, vacation days, vacation entitlement, and remaining vacation—the same details as in Manage Absences—but without editing permissions. The reason for the absence is also visible in team planning.
View Absences with Details
Where: Settings → Presence and Absences
Displays presence and absences along with the reason, such as vacation or sick leave, but no further details unless something is entered in the comments field. The reason is also visible in the team schedule.
Regular Weekly Working Hours
Relevant for resource planning, especially for part-time contracts, and also if your organization uses Octaved Flow’s time tracking.
Manage Regular Weekly Working Hours
Where: Working Hours → Weekly Working Hours
Manages the working hours per weekday, which are typically contractually agreed upon (default: Mon–Fri, 8 hours each). Additionally, you can specify a different project working time. This is useful if not all working hours are available for projects.
View regular weekly working hours
Where: Working Hours → Weekly Working Hours
Displays the settings for weekly working hours; editing is not permitted.
Project Time Tracking
Viewing and Downloading Timesheets (Freelancers)
Where: Billing → Freelancer Timesheets
Displays project time entries available for download. Intended for freelancers who bill for their project work: The project time entries, which are generated for client billing anyway, also serve as the basis for the freelancer’s invoice. This avoids duplicate time tracking.
Octaved Flow does not distinguish between full-time employees and freelancers. Therefore, use the Applies to section to specifically restrict this role, for example, to a user group consisting of freelancers.
Viewing Others’ Time Entries by Name
Time entries can be displayed anonymously or with the name of the user who entered them. This role controls who can see whose name.
Time Tracking
Only relevant if your organization uses Octaved Flow’s time tracking feature.
Both roles in this section include the right to view the reason for absence. This is necessary for effective oversight: A short work session on a vacation day may be acceptable, but no work should be done on a sick day.
Track and Manage Time Tracking
Where: Work Time → Track
Monitors and edits time tracking entries, for example, if someone forgets to stop the timer before going on vacation.
View Time Tracking
Where: Work Time → Track
Reviews time logs without editing permissions. In medium and large organizations, this is typically done by department heads for their own departments.
Responsible
By default, both roles are assigned to all internal users on both sides. Restrict them if you do not want everyone to be able to assign anyone as responsible. This is particularly useful in larger organizations with subsidiaries. This setting controls which users appear in the drop-down list. To assign users as responsible, the user must also have the appropriate permissions, such as the Project Manager project role.
Assign as Responsible
Enters the users listed under Applies to as responsible for work packages and tasks, or assigns a project role to users.
Example of a restriction: Only department heads may assign work to their own department.
Show in Team Planning
Displays the users listed under Applies to in Team Planning, including their workload and planned work packages.
Example of a restriction: Department heads only see their own department’s planning.
Board
Assign Questions and Mention in Text
Controls which users are displayed in drop-down lists when assigning questions or mentions.
By default, this is set to All internal users on both sides, so anyone can ask anyone else. Restrict this if questions and mentions should only take place within your own subsidiary.