Who this guide is for: Administrators (see access roles note)
Platform: Sense HR
Available on: All plans (Document templates available on Professional, Elite, and Enterprise plans)
🖊️ Access roles note:
Depending on your organisation’s access role setup, some document actions may also be available to certain non-administrator roles.
Access role management is available on Professional, Elite, and Enterprise.
Overview
Documents in Sense HR are used to store, share, track, and manage important information for both the organisation and individual employees.
Sense HR supports three main document models:
Company documents — shared static documents for groups or the whole organisation
Personal documents — employee-specific documents stored on an individual profile
Document templates — reusable structures used to create personal documents
These are managed in different parts of the system, depending on their purpose.
Company documents
Company documents are used when the same document should be shared with multiple employees.
They are typically used for:
Policies
Handbooks
Guidelines
Internal processes
General notices or reference documents
Company documents are:
Shared with audiences such as the whole company, selected groups, or specific individuals
Static and non-personalised
Managed from the main Documents area
Suitable for documents that do not need merge tags or e-signatures
Navigation path:
HR Dashboard > Documents
🖊️ Note:
Company documents are designed for distribution, not personalisation.
Personal documents
Personal documents are used for documents that belong to a specific employee profile.
They are typically used for:
Employment contracts
Offer letters
Signed agreements
Individual acknowledgements
Employee-specific uploaded documents or links
Personal documents are:
Stored on the employee’s profile
Created as individual document records against employee profiles
Able to include actions such as To be read or To be signed
Able to use merge tags and e-signatures, depending on how the document is created
Navigation path:
People > [select profile] > Documents
🖊️ Note:
On Elite and Enterprise plans, Screen Designer can be used to remove the Documents screen from certain profile templates. If that screen is not present, personal documents cannot be added from that profile.
Document templates
Document templates are reusable document structures used to create personal documents.
They are useful for documents that:
Are issued frequently
Follow a standard structure
Need to be personalised using employee data
May require e-signatures
Templates can support:
Basic merge tags
Advanced merge tags
E-signature fields
Optional Document drafting with AMI
Navigation path:
Templates are created in:
Settings > Documents
They are later used when:
Adding a personal document to an employee profile
Sending documents at scale using the Doc Sender agent (Elite and Enterprise plans only)
🖊️ Note:
Document templates are available on Professional, Elite, and Enterprise plans only.
Where documents are managed
Document type | Main purpose | Managed in |
Company documents | Share the same static document with many employees | Dashboard > Documents |
Personal documents | Store and manage employee-specific documents | People > [select profile] > Documents |
Document templates | Create reusable structures for personal documents | Settings > Documents |
How personal documents can be created
When adding a personal document to an employee profile, you can choose from:
Upload document
• Upload standard document — store the file exactly as uploaded
• Upload merged document — upload a PDF with merge tags to generate a personalised documentUse template — generate a structured document in the in-app editor
Add link — attach an external document by URL
🖊️ Note:
The Use template option is only available on Professional, Elite, and Enterprise plans.
Key differences between company and personal documents
Feature | Company documents | Personal documents |
Stored against an individual employee profile | ❌ No | ✅ Yes |
Assigned as one shared document to an audience | ✅ Yes | ❌ No |
Can be created for multiple employees at once | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes (using Doc Sender agent or manually sending one-by-one) |
Supports merge tags | ❌ No | ✅ Yes (depending on document method) |
Supports e-signatures | ❌ No | ✅ Yes (depending on document method) |
Managed from the main Documents module | ✅ Yes | ❌ No |
Managed from an employee profile | ❌ No | ✅ Yes |
🖊️ Note:
When personal documents are sent in bulk, Sense HR still creates a separate document instance for each employee profile.
Key differences between personal document methods
Feature | Template | Merged document (PDF) | Standard document (PDF) | Link |
Personalisation | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes (basic merge tags) | ❌ No | ❌ No |
Advanced merge tags | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ❌ No | ❌ No |
E-signatures | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ❌ No |
Stored in Sense | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (external) |
Editable in Sense | ✅ Yes | ❌ No | ❌ No | ❌ No |
Document lifecycle in Sense HR
A typical personal document workflow looks like this:
A document template is created (optional)
A document instance is created for a specific employee
Permissions and actions are applied
A To Do is created if the document must be read or signed
Activity is tracked through document history and reporting
For company documents, the lifecycle is simpler:
A document is uploaded to the Company area
An audience is assigned
Access and activity are tracked through document history and reporting
Document access and visibility (overview)
Document visibility depends on:
Access Roles
Document-level permissions
In general:
Company documents are visible to the audience they are assigned to
Personal documents are visible based on both profile access and document-level assignment (See access and visibility for Personal documents)
Read and sign actions can give users access to a specific document task without giving them ongoing visibility of the document
Document drafting with AMI
Document drafting with AMI is available within the document template editor (Professional, Elite, and Enterprise plans only).
This is an embedded AMI experience in Settings > Documents.
Within the document editor, you can use Document drafting with AMI in two ways:
Enter a natural-language prompt in the AMI chat box
Click Advanced to open the guided prompt panel
AMI helps generate or refine content only. Merge tags, advanced merge tags, and e-signature fields must still be added manually where required.
When to use each document model
Use company documents when:
The same document should be shared across groups or the whole organisation
No personalisation is needed
Use personal documents when:
The document belongs to a specific employee profile
You need acknowledgements, signatures, or employee-specific content
Use document templates when:
You regularly create similar personal documents
You want consistency, reuse, and automation
You need merge tags or e-signature-ready structures
You want to send personal documents at scale using the Doc Sender agent (Elite and Enterprise plans only)
Best practice
Use company documents for static, shared content
Use personal documents for employee-specific records and actions
Use templates for repeatable personal-document workflows
Review permissions carefully before assigning documents
Avoid combining To be read and signature merge tags on the same document for a signatory, unless both actions are genuinely required
Review document history or reports when auditing access