HR to ITSM
Workday ServiceNow integration: users and onboarding requests without HR Service Delivery
With an integration between Workday and ServiceNow, employees from Workday are users in ServiceNow, with employee number, department, location, cost centre and manager, and KoppelHet creates a request in the ServiceNow service catalog for every Hire, Change Job or Termination in Workday. This works with ServiceNow ITSM alone: the onboarding request is in the new employee's name, with start date, job, manager and location.
What the integration does
Organisations with Workday for HR and ServiceNow ITSM for the service desk, but without ServiceNow HR Service Delivery, pull users from Active Directory through LDAP, without cost centre and often with an outdated manager. Approvals for requests therefore reach the wrong person.
- KoppelHet reads a Workday report with the workers changed since the previous round.
- New departments, locations and cost centres go to ServiceNow first, so users can reference them afterwards.
- KoppelHet delivers the workers to an import table in ServiceNow. ServiceNow transforms them into users and updates existing users on employee ID.
- When department or manager change in Workday, the user and the approval route in ServiceNow follow on the effective date.
- After the last working day the user becomes inactive. Tickets and history stay linked to the user.
- When the hire date falls within the agreed lead time, KoppelHet orders the onboarding item from the service catalog in the new user's name.
- A Change Job results in a change request for access and equipment; a Termination in an offboarding request for the last day of work.
What to watch for with Workday and ServiceNow
- A Hire is often completed in Workday weeks before the first working day. KoppelHet's report includes workers with a future hire date, so the onboarding request is in ServiceNow within the agreed lead time, even though the worker is not yet active in Workday.
- For a Termination Workday has the last day of work as well as the termination date. The offboarding request targets the last day of work, because that is when the laptop must come back; the user only becomes inactive after the termination date.
- If a Hire is rescinded in Workday, the future worker disappears from the report. KoppelHet then adds a note to the open onboarding request, so IT no longer prepares a laptop for someone who is not coming.
- ServiceNow has its own Workday integration, but it belongs to HR Service Delivery and requires an Integration Hub subscription. Organisations with only ServiceNow ITSM often lack both. KoppelHet delivers the Workday data through ServiceNow's standard import function.
- ServiceNow's Workday integration requires rights for the integration user in Workday on benefits and payment data, among others. KoppelHet only reads the personal and organisation data the service desk needs.
- Many ServiceNow environments already take users from Active Directory, keyed on the logon name. KoppelHet updates those existing users on employee ID or email address, so no second user per employee appears.
- The standard import from Active Directory in ServiceNow has no transform for departments, and a manager arrives there as an LDAP path. From Workday, department, cost centre and manager arrive as real references, so approvals and reports per department are right.
- ServiceNow can run an import only after an earlier import has finished. KoppelHet uses that to load departments, locations and cost centres first and the users afterwards, so a new department exists before the first employee references it.
- Workday records changes with an effective date, often weeks ahead. KoppelHet only delivers a new department or manager to ServiceNow on that date, so approvals stay with the current manager until that day.
This integration is also part of joiner, mover, leaver.
How we build and run it
- The integration runs on the KoppelHet platform, hosted in a data centre in the EU.
- Every sync and every error is visible in the functional log; on an error your administrator is notified.
- A change that cannot go through is not half-applied but queued for another attempt.
- KoppelHet is ISO 27001 certified. Data travels encrypted and stays on the platform no longer than needed.
- After go-live we manage the integration and adjust it when your process changes.
- The integration fits next to your existing integration layer. Only the fields in the design are transferred; the platform keeps no register of its own.
Implementation and price
This is not an app you switch on. We build the integration for your organisation on our platform, with building blocks we reuse on every project. So it is custom work that does not start from scratch.
A consultant prepares the intake and analyses both systems. We then record the mapping and exceptions field by field, test in the test or acceptance environment and go live at a moment you choose. Costs are a one-off amount for the setup and a monthly amount for platform, monitoring and support.
Frequently asked questions
Can we also have tickets created for onboarding and offboarding?
Yes, also without HR Service Delivery. For a Hire KoppelHet orders the onboarding item from your ITSM service catalog, four weeks before the hire date by default, and for a Termination the offboarding item for the last day of work. The tasks per team are set up by you in the item's flow.
When is ServiceNow's own Workday integration the better choice?
If you already have ServiceNow HR Service Delivery and Integration Hub and want to handle HR tasks in ServiceNow. For just users and organisation in ITSM that is usually more than needed.
Does our LDAP import from Active Directory stay?
Yes, if you want it to. We agree per field which source wins, for example the logon name from Active Directory and department and manager from Workday.
We already have an integration platform. Does this fit alongside it?
Yes. This integration runs on the KoppelHet platform and asks nothing of your existing integration platform. Every action is in the audit logging, so operations and audit know what happened.
Technical details for IT
For those who want to know how it works under the hood: APIs, fields and sources used.
- Workday is read through a RaaS report with an Integration System User with read-only rights on worker and organisation data, filtered on effective and entry moment.
- ServiceNow is written through the Import Set API (POST /api/now/import/{stagingTableName}/insertMultiple) into staging tables with transform maps and coalesce on employee_number, with run_after to process cmn_department, cmn_location and cmn_cost_center before sys_user. Integration user with only the roles for these tables.
- For comparison - ServiceNow's Workday HR Spoke is built for Workday SOAP API v33.2, compatible up to v39.0, and requires an Integration Hub subscription.
- Tickets through the Service Catalog API: POST /api/sn_sc/servicecatalog/items/{sys_id}/order_now with the catalog variables in variables and the user in sysparm_requested_for. This creates a request (REQ) with a requested item (RITM); the catalog item's flow creates the catalog tasks (sc_task) per assignment group. A note on an open request goes through the Table API on sc_req_item. KoppelHet stores the RITM number per employee per event.
Which fields are transferred
The key fields. The full mapping is agreed per customer.
| Field in Workday | Field in ServiceNow | Notes |
|---|---|---|
Employee_ID | employee_number | Key for updating (coalesce) |
Legal of preferred first name | first_name | |
Last name | last_name | |
Work email | email | |
Business title | title | |
Supervisory organization | department (cmn_department) | |
Location | location (cmn_location) | |
Cost center | cost_center (cmn_cost_center) | |
Company | company (core_company) | |
Manager (Employee_ID) | manager (sys_user) | |
Termination date | active = false | |
Indiensttreding, wijziging of vertrek | Catalogusitem voor onboarding, wijziging of offboarding | A separate item per event, chosen at the start |
Gesynchroniseerde gebruiker | sysparm_requested_for | The request is in the name of the new employee |
Hire date of last day of work | Variabele startdatum of laatste werkdag | |
Manager (Employee_ID) | Variabele manager (verwijzing naar sys_user) | |
Location | Variabele locatie (cmn_location) | |
Business title | Variabele functie | |
Afdeling of team | Toewijzingsgroep van de catalog tasks | Through the catalog item flow |
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