The HiBob integration brings employee master data and absences from HiBob into ZEP. HiBob is a people management system focused on employee records, onboarding and absence management. HiBob remains the leading system for this data, ZEP adopts it and uses it for time tracking and reports.
Data direction:
• Employee master data: HiBob → ZEP
• Absences: HiBob → ZEP
• Time entries: ZEP → HiBob, optional
Product line availability
Note: The HiBob integration is available in ZEP Compact and ZEP Professional. It is not included in ZEP Clock. Booking is subject to a charge and runs through the Self-Service Tool.
Importing absences additionally requires the Absences & Overtime module. Assigning a default price group requires the Revenues & Costs module (in ZEP Compact) or ZEP Professional.
Setup and configuration are reserved for administrators.
Requirements
To set up the integration you need:
Access to the Connector Marketplace in ZEP
A HiBob account in which you are allowed to create a service user
The service user ID and the service user token from HiBob
Absence reasons created in ZEP for the absence types that are to come from HiBob
Tip: You create the service user in HiBob under Settings > Integrations > Service Users. Note down the ID and the token right away, the token is only visible while it is being created.
Setting up the integration
In ZEP, go to Administration > Interfaces > Connector Marketplace. Select HiBob and add it. You will be guided through the booking process in the Self-Service Tool.
After booking, configure the integration on its detail page. The form is divided into five areas.
Under Authentication Settings you enter the credentials:
Service user ID: the ID of the service user created in HiBob
Service user token: the matching token
Under Sync Master Data you control the employee import:
Import Employees: adopts employee data from HiBob. Active by default.
Username Generation: defines how ZEP forms the username for newly imported employees. Available are FirstName.LastName and First Letter + LastName. The default is the part of the email address before the at sign, extended by the HiBob ID.
The next two areas each hold a single switch. Sync Absences holds Import Absences, active by default. Export Time Entries holds the switch of the same name, inactive by default.
Under Employee Defaults you find the defaults for newly imported employees:
Default Price Group: the price group code new employees receive. The default is 01. The code must exist in ZEP.
Show Cost Accounting: controls whether new employees are included in ZEP cost accounting.
Use Test Connection to check that ZEP can reach HiBob with the credentials before the first transfer runs.
Data transfer
The integration transfers employee master data and absences from HiBob to ZEP. Time entries can additionally go in the opposite direction.
Employees
Data direction HiBob → ZEP. The following is adopted:
HiBob employee ID as a permanent matching key
Email address
First name and last name
Department
Job title
Start and end date of employment, if stored in HiBob
ZEP stores the start and end date as an employment period. The department is resolved against the departments present in ZEP. ZEP recognizes existing employees by the HiBob employee ID and updates them instead of creating duplicates.
Tip: Create the departments from HiBob in ZEP beforehand. If ZEP finds no matching department, the field stays empty on the imported employee.
Absences
Data direction HiBob → ZEP. Per absence the following is transferred:
Assignment to the employee
Absence type from HiBob, which determines the ZEP absence reason
Start date and end date
Scope, meaning full day, half day or hourly
Description as a note on the absence
ZEP covers a period from the previous year to the following year and detects on every synchronization which entries are new, have changed or have been removed in HiBob. Long periods are retrieved in segments of at most 179 days, because the HiBob interface does not answer larger windows.
ZEP adopts half-day and hourly absences with their scope. If an absence spans several days and only the first or last day is a half day, ZEP splits the entry accordingly.
Assigning absence reasons
For an absence to arrive in ZEP, the HiBob absence type must be assigned to a ZEP absence reason. You make this assignment on the absence reason itself, under Administration > Overtime & absences > Reasons for Absence. There, right next to the Abbreviation, is the field External Connector ID. Enter the name of the HiBob absence type there.
For an absence type without an assignment, ZEP transfers nothing. The synchronization does not stop, but the affected absence types appear in the integration log. Check the log after the first synchronization and add missing assignments.
Example: If the absence type in HiBob is called Vacation, enter the external connector ID Vacation on the ZEP absence reason Urlaub. The ZEP abbreviation stays untouched, both systems may keep their own names.
Time entries
Data direction ZEP → HiBob. This transfer is inactive by default and is switched on with Export Time Entries. Per entry, the date and the start and end of the working time are transferred. This way your employees also see the working times they recorded in ZEP in HiBob, without having to enter them there a second time. HiBob receives only the working time itself, none of the further details of your ZEP entries.
Note: Exporting time entries requires your HiBob account to include time tracking. If it is not active there, HiBob does not accept the entries.
Synchronization and log
Once set up, the integration synchronizes the data automatically every hour. A task under Administration > System > Tasks is not needed, control lies entirely with the Connector Marketplace.
The integration's detail page shows the current status and the log of the most recent synchronizations, including messages about records that could not be adopted. A synchronization can also be triggered there manually, for example after you have changed the configuration.
For master data and absences, HiBob is the leading system. You make changes there and ZEP adopts them with the next synchronization. The default values for price group and cost accounting apply only when an employee is created and can afterwards be adjusted per employee in ZEP.