Zendesk Workforce management (WFM) roles and permissions ensure that agents and admins have access to the WFM features they need to use.
Your account includes standard, predefined roles that all Zendesk users are initially assigned to. You can also create your own custom WFM roles to reflect your organization's structure and access management system.
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Overview of WFM roles and permissions
WFM roles and permissions allow you to manage who can do what in your account. They help your organization run smoothly by making sure everyone has the access they need.
- Standard roles are predefined and can’t be deleted. All users in your Zendesk account are assigned to a standard role initially depending on what their role is in Zendesk.
- Custom roles are defined by admins who determine which parts of your WFM account users in these roles can access. This includes who can see which teams, locations, and workstreams.
When you assign someone to a role, they inherit the permissions and scopes associated with the role. Note that users can be assigned to only one role at a time.
Both standard and custom roles have the same structure, which include:
- Permissions – Allows users to access certain areas of your WFM account, such as scheduling, reporting, or admin settings. Permissions keep your account secure and ensure that users have access only to what they need.
- Scopes – Determines the teams, locations, and workstreams that users have access to in their role. Setting the scope for a role allows admins to give users permission for certain features, without sharing information about all teams, locations, and workstreams.
- Agents – The users assigned to the role.
Standard WFM roles
Your WFM account has two standard, predefined roles: Admin and Agent. By default, Zendesk admins are automatically assigned to the WFM admin role. The rest of your Zendesk team members are assigned to the WFM agent role.
In addition to the standard roles, you can create custom roles that reflect your organization’s structure and reassign users to those roles.
Admin role
WFM admins have permissions for all features, can manage which users are assigned to each role, and their scope includes access to information about all teams, locations, and workstreams.
Your account must always have at least one user assigned to the default WFM admin role. For example, you may want your system administrator to be assigned to this role so that they have full access to all features and resources in the system.
Agent role
By default, the standard WFM agent role gives permission for agents to access only the Agent Schedule in Zendesk Support. Admins can edit this role to give permission to access more features though.
The scope for users assigned to the standard WFM agent role includes access to information about their own teams, locations, and workstreams.
Custom WFM roles
Custom WFM roles are roles admins create that reflect your organization’s structure. Create custom roles to allow or restrict access and specify different permissions for your agents, team leads, admins, managers, or other roles.
- Manager
- Supervisor
- Team lead
WFM permissions
WFM permissions are segmented by the general feature area and include the following:
Permissions | Description |
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Forecast and scheduling: | |
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Access the Forecast page and make changes to forecasts, including recalculating or regenerating. |
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Access the Schedule page and generate, publish, edit, delete and import schedules. |
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View, approve, deny, and reopen time off requests. |
Reporting: | |
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View, edit, create, export, and delete custom reports. |
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View, duplicate, and export system reports. |
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View, create, edit and delete scheduled reports. |
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View, edit, create, and delete dashboards, including editing dashboard widgets. |
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Access the Agent activity page and edit and delete activities. |
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Access the Agent attendance page. |
Admin: | |
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View and edit the account’s organization structure, which includes locations, workstreams, teams, time off reasons, and roles and permissions. |
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View, create, edit, and delete automations. |
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View and edit integrations by changing their parameters, including turning them on and off. |
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Access and edit account settings. |
Agent: | |
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Access the Agent schedule, request time off, create and manage shift trade requests. |