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Import/ Export People Custom Fields
Tina Chan avatar
Written by Tina Chan
Updated over 2 weeks ago

Only Admin users with Edit Account Settings and Data set as On have access to the CSV Import & Export Tool.

People Custom fields allow you to add, filter and report information specific to your organization. Learn more about custom fields in Runn here.

You can use the CSV Import/Exporter to:

  • Add new Custom Fields data to people

  • Export People Custom Fields data

  • Update Existing Custom Fields data of people

Please click on the Table of Contents on the right to jump to the section that is relevant to you.

Set Up your Custom Fields First

You MUST set up your custom fields first before using this importer.

If you only have a few custom fields to set up, go to Manage > Custom Fields to set them up manually.

If you have many custom fields to set up, use the Custom Field Set Up CSV Importer to create them in bulk.

Adding/ Updating Custom Fields data to People

If your account already has People imported and the custom fields set up, you can easily download the list of people and custom fields, make the changes and re-import the CSV file to Runn.

The data in the newly imported CSV file will overwrite/add to existing data in Runn.

1. Exporting Existing Data

  1. Hover your cursor to the top right-hand corner, click Settings

  2. Click CSV

  3. From the People Tab, expand People Custom Fields

  4. Click Download Existing People Custom Fields CSV

You will now see a list of all your people and the people's custom field names as the column headers.

2. Preparing your data in the CSV file

Data Format and Requirements

Refer to the Data Format and Requirements section to prepare your data.

Here are some points to note:

Column headers

  • It is recommended that the column header names stay the same as those you see in the file downloaded from Runn. This way, Runn can automatically map the data into the system

Can I use my own column header names in my CSV file?

If it is more convenient for you to use your internal naming conventions in the column headers, it is also possible. You will have to manually match the data with a few clicks during the importing process

Our CSV tool allows you to match the column headers into Runn's format with just a few clicks. See the help article here.

Person Identifier column

  • The numeric value in the Person Identifier column in the downloaded file is Runn's Person ID, a unique identifier in Runn.

  • You can keep it as is. If you have a data set that uses the person's email address or Employee ID added in the External References field as the unique identifier, you can add emails/ external references to the Person Identifier column to update the person's data:

Remove all unrequired columns

  • If you have other columns on your spreadsheet that are not listed in the downloaded CSV file, please remove all these columns before importing

Ensure no duplicated records

  • Make sure that there are no duplicated time off entries and that each record has a unique email address/ external references ID number/ Runn Person ID

3. Importing the CSV file

After preparing the CSV file, you can import the updated data in Runn.

  1. Hover your cursor to the top right-hand corner, click Settings

  2. Click CSV

  3. From the People Tab, expand People Custom Fields

(Skip this if this is your initial account setup or you are just adding new data)

If you want to remove and replace existing values for the multi select custom fields with the ones in your file, you can choose Replace mode before clicking the Import button.

Read this help article to learn more.

4. Click Import People Custom Fields CSV

4. Upload People Custom Fields

Drag your file to the screen or click Import People Custom Fields CSV

5. Matching the columns

On this screen, the items on the left are the column headers in your CSV file, while the items on the right are the column headers required in our CSV Tool.

If you haven't changed the column headers, they should be exactly the same. In this case, click Confirm

What do I do if the column headers are not the same?

Check out this help article to learn more.

6. Reviewing Entries

Carefully scroll through the page and check if all the information is correct. Fix any typos if needed:

❌ What to do if there is an error?

Check out this article to learn more about how to fix general errors.

❌ What to do when I see the "Option does not exist" error?

Check out this article to learn more about how to fix this type of error.

If everything looks good, click Complete Import

Congratulations! You have successfully imported people custom fields! 🎉

7. Validating the data

You can validate if the data are successfully uploaded by following the steps below:

  1. Go to Manage > People

  2. Look for a person whose custom field data you have updated

  3. View the Person Dashboard > Details Tab to see if the new custom field data is there


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