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Introduction
SuccessFactors Employee Profile provides self-service functions and Information regarding the HR master data. Employee Profile offers a Basic organizational chart and an employee directory, which can be made available to the employees via the web and mobile applications.
The Profile may contain attachments like Certificates, Pay slips, Appraisal Letters, Bonus Letters, Warning Letters, Identity proofs like National ID, passport, marriage certificates, Work visa, etc. for individual employees. If these documents need to be uploaded for a few employees, then it can be added to the profile directly. For a large number of employees, it can only be imported via backend job.
Prerequisites
- SFTP Credentials and Provisioning System Credentials
- Attachments that need to be Uploaded
Batch Upload of Documents
SuccessFactors Support Team with Provisioning System access will run the job in the backend of the instance to batch upload a list of attachments to the Employee Profile. The Files must be zipped and imported together with a .csv file that maps the attachment names to the ID of the employee. The zipped file will be uploaded to SFTP Server.
Attachment Block/Section in Employee Profile
The Attachments Block or Section can be added to the Employee profile using Configure People Profile. The existing attachments can be replaced with new attachments or new attachments can be incrementally added to the profile.
Preparing a ZIP File
In SuccessFactors, go to Admin Centre > Export Extended User Information > Select “Background Information”. Check the Export Selected Background Information and select the portlet for which the attachment must be imported. Click on Export Template.
Uploading of Bonus Letter is considered as an example to explain the process in this blog. Using the header provided in the Export Template is recommended.
This is example .csv file header,
UserId - The UserId of the corresponding employee
AssignmentId - Same value as UserId
Documents - stands for the portlet’s name in the XML code of the instance. It should have same value as header in all the entries
DocName – Name of the Document
attachment - It is used to add the filename, the mapping is made between the UserId → filename.
date – date to be displayed in portlet in Employee Profile
warningType – Type of the Document
The .csv file for Bonus Letter Upload will look like this,
Ensure that the attachments are uploaded to the Active Users only. If the user is not present in the instance or Inactive, the job will show the error message as "The userId is invalid, unknown, or unauthorized".
Once the .csv file and the attachments that should be imported are all present in the same folder, select all files in the folder and zip them. Please ensure that the attachment files have No Subfolder in the Zipped File.
The system does not support the use of Non-ASCII Characters (Special Characters) for attachments import, so if any such characters are included in the name of the files being imported or in the .csv mapping file, the import will fail.
Make sure that the Zipped file can be unzipped before uploading it to the SFTP server. If the file cannot be unzipped, then there may be errors in the compression of the files and the import will not be possible and cannot be able to retrieve the content inside the zipped file.
Uploading to SFTP Server
Login to SFTP Server with the Credentials provided and Create a New Folder in the SFTP Server.
Upload or Drag and Drop the created Zip File into the Created Folder in SFTP Server.
Make sure to have a complete backup (Export Background Information) of Attachments of all the employees before proceeding with the import. Currently, there is no option to restore the deleted information.
Configuration in Provisioning System
Login to the Provisioning System using the Credentials and Select the Company. Select Create New Job in Manage Scheduled Jobs. Enter the Job Name and Job Owner. The Job Owner will be authenticating all submitted jobs. They will also be the default user to receive Email notifications regarding the Job. If the Job Owner does not have enough permission, the job might fail with error, "The user ID is invalid, unknown, or unauthorized". Select " Live Profile Import" as Job Type.
In Job Parameters, Select Background Information. Check "Upload Attachments along with Data". If "Import by incrementally adding data" option is selected, every data in the import file will be added to the profile. It does not overwrite the existing information in the Employee Profile. If "Import by overwriting existing data" option is selected, it will upload files by replacing existing data with attachments in the import file.
In the next section, Check "SF hosted SFTP server". Enter the Host Address of the SFTP Server, FTP Login and enter the FTP Password. Check the "SFTP Protocol". Click on "Test Connection" and "Test File Put Permission".
In the next section,
File Path - Name of folder in SFTP Server
File Name - Name of the Zip File uploaded in the SFTP folder
File Encryption – None
As the Bonus Letter is uploaded as Batches, the Occurrence can be set as Once. Add Additional Email Recipients and Check "Send Email when job starts".
Click on Create Job, Submit the Job and Run the Job. You can see the progress in Monitor Jobs. Make sure the Job is running for only one time for each batch, otherwise duplicate data will be added in the People Profile. The Removal of duplicate Attachments where there are lots of Employee records are maintained is very tedious.
Conclusion
By following the steps provided in this blog, importing of Attachments in the Employee Profile can be executed. I hope that the Blog post has been useful for the understanding of 'Live Profile Import' and Batch upload of documents in employee Profile. Suggestions and ideas are welcomed.
References and Support Articles
- 3044333- Error when importing data from zip using Live Profile Import job
- 2087993- SFTP: Automating Data Imports & Exports via a Scheduler in SuccessFactors
- 2884845- Live Profile Export (Including Attachments) - Employee Profile
- 2218874 - Upload of attachments to Employee Profile - SAP Employee Profile
- 2212605- Understanding and using the generic sections - Scheduled Job setup - Partner & Support
- 2415773 - How to Remove Specific Attachments from Background Portlets - Employee Profile
- 2790234 - Delete Duplicate Background Data
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