This guide will show you will show you how to create Employee Additional Information, Categories and Fields.
Contents
- Introduction
- To create the Additional Information category
- To create the fields for the Additional Information category
- To make the Additional Information category available
- To record Additional Information data
- Examples
Introduction
- There may be data that you wish to store in HR where there is no standard page and there is a need to store historic or multiple records against each employee: eg the history of company vehicles that an employee has had
- In such instances you can create an Additional Information category
- The Category allows you to group together a number of bespoke fields into an ‘eform’ for your users to complete (access is controlled by security permissions)
- Both Additional Information (AI) and Further Information (FI) provide the ability for your HR system to be configured so that custom extra fields are made available to hold your bespoke data, and this topic will focus on AI
- FI Fields are covered in more detail in the linked guide and there is also detailed e-learning in Ciphr Academy that compares Additional Information vs Further Information so it’s recommended to view this topic if you’d like some help to decide which method is best for various requirements
- There are two types of AI:
- Employee AI – information recorded on the employee’s record
- Jobs AI – information recorded on a Job which is linked to an employee when they are assigned to the Job, such as a uniform
- Security at Field Group levels and for specific Categories can be applied such that Users in specific roles can see specified Categories
- A Picklist can be attached to a field within a Category so that data entry is controlled by selecting from the contents of a list
| Note: Click the link for more details on User Role management. |
To create the Additional Information category
- Go to the following area:
- Latest (left-hand) menu: Personal > Personal Information Configuration > Configure Additional Information
- Pre 2025 (top) menu: System > System Administration > Additional Information Configuration
- A list of existing Additional Information categories will be presented
- Click Insert New Record
- Enter a Description which is what will be displayed to your users
- The Security Field Group can restrict Record Group access but note this applies to the whole Category as it’s not currently possible to restrict specific fields within the Category
- A separate Role Management Action – Additional Information has overall control of a User Role’s access to the Category (covered later in this topic)
- The Security Field Group is only relevant to HR type users where you may wish to restrict access to particular Record Groups
- Eg: you record company shares information in AI and want to restrict the Directors’ share package details from the wider HR team
- Or you record health declarations and wish to restrict the HR Team from seeing their colleagues’ data
- The Notes Heading is optional and if populated, will add an extra tab to the end (right hand side) of your Category form when created, with a large (virtually unlimited characters) text box which can be useful to capture extra notes as needed
- Click Update to save the Category header
- A Success message will confirm the record has been created
- Click Edit to start adding fields to the new Category
- A Delete button will appear under the Update button but this can only be applied where the Category has not been ‘used’ on any employee records
- Any historical data will prevent deletion
- A pop-up message will advise which record(s) have data stored if you attempt to Delete a used field
To create the fields for the Additional Information category
- Within your new Category a Details section will appear as the lower section of the page to add your fields
- Click Add new record
- There are 81 fields available to use per Category
- 20 Text (free text up to 255 characters)
- 20 Date (date picker calendar)
- 20 Number
- 20 Logical (slider toggle button)
- 1 Notes field (virtually unlimited characters – controlled by the Notes Heading field being populated in the Category Information top section rather than in the field list) which will appear on its own tab if used
- Select the field Type (Text, Date, Number or Logical) and then choose the next available field Name for that type (between 1 and 20)
| Note: The different field types 1–20 are available per Category so each time a Category is created you will have the full choice of fields. This differs to Further Information Fields where the field types 1–20 are available per Page so can only be used once in each area |
- Give the field a Heading which is how it will display on the form
- For the first field the Tab selector will be empty, type the text you want to appear as the first Tab heading
- This name will then be available for other fields which may be placed on the same tab or you can type more text to add another Tab
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Tip: The Tabs will display left to right on your form in the order they are added (if adding more than one), so it’s worth considering the order of the overall form before you add all your fields. If using the Notes Heading Tab this will always appear at the end (right hand side) of the Tabs |
- Define the Field Order On Tab – this is the order that the fields will be presented on that tab
- It’s recommended to space out the numbers, eg 10, 20 etc, then if you wish to reorder you can easily slot fields in. Eg add 15 to slot between 10 and 20
- Define the Grid Order – this is optional and can be used to determine the display of prominent fields that will be presented in a summary format, where there may be numerous records for the category on a person’s record
- Leaving the order blank will not include the field on the summary view
- The example below shows fields that have been selected to appear in the summary grid, so you can easily see which periods of family leave each record relates to
- Finally select, if applicable, All Controls to choose any Controls to be attached to the field such as a Text Picklist, Date range, or Number range (these vary dependent upon which field Type is selected, Logical does not have any Controls)
| Note: If using a Text Picklist this must be built in advance to then be attached to the field within a Category. The Picklist will then appear as a dropdown list when being completed on a person’s record so that data entry is controlled. |
- Click Update in the right hand column of the field you are working on to save it
- Continue using Add new record to add any further fields for the Category as required
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Note: Each field has a Delete button to remove it but this can only be applied if the field hasn’t been ‘used’ and saved on an employee record, in the same manner as the overall Category Delete button. Once history has been created on employee records this will prevent the field being deleted A pop-up message will advise which record(s) have data stored if you attempt to Delete a used field |
To make the Additional Information category available
- Security for each Category can be applied so each User Roles can see and/or update specified Categories
| Note: Each new Category will be Hidden by default so will need to be amended per User Role (including the role who created the Category) to grant access. |
- Go to the following area:
- Latest (left-hand) menu: Security Configuration > Role Management
- Pre-2025 (top) menu: System > Security > Role Management
- A list of existing User Roles will be presented
- Click on the User Role that the Category is to be made available to and then click on Additional Information from the list of Actions
| Note: If using Jobs Additional Information, access is controlled on the separate Action button in the same way |
- All the AI Categories will be presented and dependent on the User Role that you are viewing you will be able to change your Own Permissions and Subordinate Permissions to grant Write Access / Read Only / Hidden access to each Category
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Tip: If granting Write Access to employees this means they can complete the Category form themselves to improve self-service interaction and reduce HR paperwork The data can then be approved by a Manager or HR user as required which is controlled by page Verification Settings The Verification Setting will apply to all Write Access Categories as it relates to the Page rather than specific Categories |
- Changes will need to be made to all User Roles requiring access to this Category
- Make the changes and click Review Changes > Update if the changes are correct
- The users in the modified User Role(s) will now have access to the Category and data can be recorded in that Category
| Note: For a User Role to access any AI Categories they must have also access to the (Employee) Additional Information Page. |
To record employee Additional Information data
- To see your Categories in action go to the following area:
- Latest (left-hand) menu: Personal > Additional Information
- Pre-2025 (top) menu: Personal Data > Personal Information > Employee Additional Information
- All the Categories available to your User Role will be listed
- Search for the person who you wish to view
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If Jobs AI has been set up for the person’s job, a second tab will be present showing [Job Title] Additional Info (example highlighted below). This is read only as it is edited in the Jobs page
- Click on a Category and it will show a list of any existing records and an Insert New Record button (subject to security access) to add a record
- In this example below some history has been created for the employee, and the fields visible in this summary view are controlled by the Grid Order configuration
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Tips: Testing
Notifications
Reporting
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Further learning in Ciphr Academy
- If you'd like to look at some examples or videos to show you this area in more detail, check out the Additional Information e-learning in our Ciphr Academy.
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