What someone can see and do in TalentHR depends on their user role and on the field-level access set for each employee field. This FAQ answers the access questions we're asked most often. For full setup steps, see How to work with custom user roles in TalentHR and How to manage field-level access for Employee and Asset records in TalentHR.

A. Roles basics

1. Where do I control what someone can see and do?

Each person has one user role at a time. Functional roles, such as Manager, Time off approver or Hiring team member, apply on top of it (see What are the user roles in TalentHR). Users with the built-in Employee role don't see the Settings menu.

2. Which role should I give someone who needs to help manage TalentHR?

• Admin: full access, including the Subscription section.
• HR Manager: the same access as an Admin, except Subscription. Field-level access can be further limited for HR Managers, if needed.
• Custom user role: only the areas and actions you choose (Settings > Roles).

To give someone their own login:

1. Click Add employee and create their profile with their own email address. To set up their role before they're notified, select Don't send invitation email.

2. Assign their role (see "How do I assign a role, and how can I check who has it?" below).

3. Send the invitation from their profile (Actions > Send invitation) so they can set a password and sign in.

3. Can I change the permissions of the built-in Admin, HR Manager or Employee roles?

No. Built-in roles can't be edited or deleted. Clone the closest one and adjust the copy instead.

To create a custom role from a built-in role:

1. Sign in to TalentHR as an Admin or HR Manager and go to Settings > Roles.

2. Click the three-dot icon next to the role to start from (for example, Employee) and select Clone.

3. In the window that opens, select who should get the role under Users, and save.

4. Check or uncheck permissions in the new role's column, then click Save.

Clone Employee to add a few permissions to regular employee access, or HR Manager to remove some areas from HR-level access. Some features only work for roles based on HR Manager (see "Why can't a custom role see Files, assets or the Action Hub?" below).

4. How do I assign a role, and how can I check who has it?

• One person: open their profile, click Actions below the profile image and select Assign role.
• Many people: in Settings > Roles, click the three-dot icon next to the role, select Edit and choose people under Users. You can select everyone at once, then deselect anyone who shouldn't get the role.

Assigning a role replaces the person's previous role. New employees get the default role, which is marked with an asterisk. To choose a different default, click the three-dot icon next to a role and select Make default.

Custom roles are shown on the employee's profile. To check who has a role, go to Settings > Roles, click the three-dot icon next to the role, select Edit and look at the Users field.

5. Why doesn't removing someone from a custom role stick?

This is expected. Removing a person from a role's Users field doesn't move them to another role, and they don't fall back to the default role, which only applies to newly added people. Instead, assign them the role they should have, from their profile (Actions > Assign role) or from the other role's Users field. If you delete a custom role, everyone who had it gets the default role.

6. Can I give an external consultant or accountant access without adding them as an employee?

No. There's no separate external access type. Add the person as an employee profile with their own email address and assign a role with only the access they need, such as a limited custom role. Like every active employee, they count toward your plan's user limit.

7. How do I add a second Admin or change the Owner?

A domain has one Owner, who is always an Admin, but several people can be Admins. If you're an Admin, you can give another user the Admin role from their profile (Actions > Assign role). If they don't need Subscription, the HR Manager role is enough.

In TalentHR, only the current Owner can transfer ownership: they open the new Owner's profile and select Actions > Make owner. The previous Owner stays an Admin. If the Owner has left the company, Support can transfer ownership instead (see the next question). See How to change the Owner of your TalentHR domain.

8. How do I remove someone's Admin rights or terminate an Admin?

• To make an Admin a regular user: open their profile and select Actions > Assign role. If they're the Owner, they must transfer ownership first.
• To terminate an Admin: only the Owner can terminate Admin users. If the Admin is the Owner, transfer ownership first; the new Owner can then terminate them. Once someone is no longer an Admin, an Admin or HR Manager can terminate them (Actions > Terminate employment).
• If the Owner has left the company: email help@talenthr.io with the name (as it appears in TalentHR) of the employee who should become the new Owner. They must already have a profile. 

B. What people can see

1. How do I stop employees from seeing other employees' information?

Use the View company-level information permission, in the General section of Settings > Roles. Clone the Employee role and, in the copy:

• Turn it off: users see only their own profile, settings and action items. The People directory, org chart, Calendar, Files and similar areas are hidden.
• Set it to Their team: users keep visibility of their own team only.

Assign the new role to your employees, and make it the default role if new hires should get it too. To hide only certain fields, use field-level access (next question). To limit only whose time off they see in the Calendar, change View calendar in the role's Time off section from All to Their team and Their peers (colleagues with the same manager).

If names still show somewhere afterwards, contact Support with where they appear, which roles are affected, whether it's on web or mobile, and a screenshot.

2. How do I hide sensitive fields such as SSN, personal email, phone number or date of birth?

Use field-level access: each employee field has View and Edit permissions per role, with the scopes All, Their team and Themselves.

To change who can see or edit a field:

1. Sign in as an Admin or HR Manager and go to Settings > People profiles.

2. Open the Personal fields or Job fields tab and click the Edit icon next to the field.

3. For each role, select the scopes under View and Edit. For example, set View to Themselves so employees see only their own SSN. To hide the field from a role completely, uncheck everything under View (the scope shows None).

4. Click Save.

A field hidden from a role is hidden both on profiles and in the People directory's list view.

3. Why can't employees see colleagues' department, division, location or hire date?

Hire date, Department, Division and Location don't have their own entries in Settings > People profiles; they follow the Job record field.

To show job details to a role:

1. Sign in as an Admin or HR Manager, go to Settings > People profiles > Job fields and click Edit next to Job record.

2. For each role that should see these details for everyone, set View to All (instead of Themselves or Their team).

3. Click Save, then check again from a fresh login session.

The role also needs View company-level information to see other people at all. Job record visibility also applies elsewhere, for example to an employee's division in the Calendar. Manager and Employment status have their own entries under Job fields.

4. Does "Their team" include indirect reports?

No. Their team means a user's direct reports only, one level down (Their team, themselves adds the user). When a department head opens an indirect report's profile, they see only what regular employees see. There's no scope for a whole reporting line at the moment.

If someone needs wider access:

• Profiles and fields: give them the HR Manager role or a custom role cloned from it, or set View to All for the fields they need. All covers the whole company, not just their department.
• Documents: in Settings > People profiles > Documents structure, create a dedicated folder, give their role View set to All on that folder only, and file there only the documents they may see. Because All is company-wide, keep that folder for this purpose only.

You can send your use case to Support at help@talenthr.io so it's shared with our Product team.

5. Who can see terminated employees?

Admins and HR Managers can. For other roles, the View terminated employees permission in Settings > Roles decides whether users see terminated employees in the People directory and the Terminated option in the People filters. The built-in Employee role can't see them. To view terminated employees, go to People and select Terminated in the filter on the right. See the Terminated employees FAQ.

C. What people can do

1. How do I stop employees from editing their own personal details?

In Settings > People profiles, click Edit next to each field and uncheck everything under Edit for your employee role, keeping View so they can still see their information. There's no approval step for profile changes: a role can either edit a field or not. Which fields new hires fill in at their first sign-in is set separately, under Settings > People profiles > Personal fields > Onboarding fields.

2. How can I let someone log time off for others without giving them HR Manager access?

By default, only Admins and HR Managers can add time off for other people; Managers approve or reject requests.

To create a time off role:

1. In Settings > Roles, click the three-dot icon next to Employee, select Clone, choose the people under Users and save.

2. In the new role's People section, set View time off records and Manage time off history to:

• Their team for line managers who log time off (for example, sick leave) for their direct reports, or
• All for someone who logs time off for everyone.

3. If they also need time off reports, such as the budget export under Reports > Time off, enable View time off reports in the Reporting section.

4. Click Save.

Because the role starts from Employee, it doesn't include HR Managers' access to documents. Time off they add from an employee's Time off tab is pre-approved, and they can also add time off during blocked time off periods.

3. How do I stop managers from changing employees' time off allowances?

In Settings > Roles, scroll down to the Time off section, uncheck Manage time off settings in their role's column and click Save. They can still log time off for their team if the role has Manage time off history.

4. Can Admins and HR Managers approve their own time off?

Yes. Admins, HR Managers and the Owner can approve their own requests manually, even if they have a Manager. They can also approve or reject anyone's pending request (Admins first see an Override confirmation required message); this can't be turned off for Admins.

How they record their own leave matters:

• Book time off at the top of TalentHR sends a normal request to their Manager and approvers. They can still self-approve it if they visit their own profile > Time off tab. 
• + Add time off on their profile's Time off tab adds the leave as pre-approved.

The person at the top of the org chart has no Manager, so their requests are approved automatically. For custom roles, Manage time off history set to All lets users manage time off on every profile, including their own; set it to Their team if they only manage their direct reports. See the Time off approvals FAQ.

5. Why can't a custom role see Files, Assets or the Action Hub?

• Files: in the Files section of Settings > Roles, enable Access to files module for the role, plus Manage company files if they should manage company files.
• Assets: enable Manage assets and/or Assign assets. To edit asset details, the role also needs Edit on the asset fields: in Settings > Assets > Asset fields (or Manage fields in the Assets section of Settings > Roles), click Edit next to each field, set the role's Edit to All and save.
• Action Hub: available to Admins, HR Managers and custom roles based on HR Manager. Roles cloned from Employee can't access it, even with extra permissions.

For the Action Hub, recreate the role by cloning HR Manager, remove the permissions it shouldn't have, and assign it to the same people.

D. Testing and troubleshooting

Someone can't see something they need (or sees less than before). What should I check?

1. In Settings > Roles, check the permissions of the person's role.

2. In Settings > People profiles, check the View scope of the fields involved. Fields set to Themselves or Their team are hidden for everyone else, including in the Calendar and the People directory.

3. Ask the person to sign out and back in.

You can't view TalentHR as another user, so to test a role, create a test profile with a different email address or an alias of yours, assign it the role and sign in as that user; delete the profile when you're done. 

If everything looks right and the problem continues, contact Support with the user's name, what they can't see, and a screenshot or screen recording.