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Employees, Contractors, Clients, and Contacts: An Overview
Employees, Contractors, Clients, and Contacts: An Overview

Overview of Employees, Contractors, Clients, and Contacts in Productive. Learn about permissions and collaboration in your workspace.

Updated over a week ago

In Productive, you can collaborate with various individuals classified as Employees, Contractors, Clients, and Contacts.

These classifications help you manage different relationships and access levels within your organization.

Here's a breakdown of each category:

Users vs. Non-Users

Individuals in Productive are divided into Users (Employees, Contractors, Clients) and Non-Users (Contacts). Users have login access to Productive, while Contacts do not.

  • Employees and Contractors are part of your organization and count as paid seats.

  • Clients and Contacts are external to your organization and do not count as paid seats. Contacts can be converted to Users if needed.​

Employees

Employees are integral to your organization, using Productive to track time and work, request time off, and deliver projects.

Their permissions, which determine what they can see and do within Productive, can be adjusted using system permissions or custom permission sets for greater flexibility.

Manage and add employees in Settings > Users or Resourcing > Employees.

Contractors

Contractors work with your organization but may be employed elsewhere. While they are not part of your company, they have login access and can collaborate on projects and manage tasks. Contractors are also considered paid seats.

Similar to employees, manage and add contractors in Settings > Users or Resourcing > Employees.

Clients

Clients are individuals you invite to Productive to collaborate on specific projects. They have limited visibility, primarily tied to the projects and companies you set up in Productive. Client permissions are divided into:

  • Client Staff: Can view and collaborate on tasks and projects.

  • Client Managers: Have access to budgets and basic financial data.

  • Custom client permissions can also be created for more tailored access.

Manage and add clients in Settings > Users or CRM > Contacts.

Contacts

Contacts serve as repositories for information such as notes, contact details, and emails.

  • They do not have login access but can be linked to specific companies within Productive.

  • Contacts can be converted to Users (Employees, Contractors, or Clients) at any time.

Find, add, and manage all your contact information in CRM > Contacts.

Profile Page Tabs

The profile pages for these individuals offer different tabs depending on their role.

Contacts

Have Info, and Activity tabs (the Activity tab has a Feed and an Emails section).

Employees, Contractors, and Clients

Depending on their permissions and usage, they may have the following tabs:

  • Info Tab: Contains essential information about the person, including their employee details (job title, workplace, permission set, manager, assigned service types, teams, tags, and information about automatic time tracking) and any employee fields they have been assigned.

  • Time Tab: Contains the Overview and Time entries sections, offering a snapshot of the user’s capacity, availability, bookings, and logged time.

  • Time Off: Displays all assigned time-off allocations, alongside requested and past time off.

  • Activity Tab: Consists of three sections. The Work Log tracks any activity in Productive, the Feed contains activities such as comments, attachments, and changes made to the user's profile, and the Emails section displays emails associated with the user if they are using Productive's email inbox feature.

  • Org Chart: Displays the user's position in the organizational hierarchy.

  • Projects: Lists all projects accessible to the person.

  • Cost Rates: An overview of the user’s current and past cost rates (salary), visible to admins only.

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