SSO Integration

Google Workspace SSO + Calendar Sync for UAE Teams

Sign in to Peoplifi with your Google Workspace account, auto-provision UAE employees from your Google directory, and sync approved time-off to each employee's Google Calendar. 5-minute setup using OAuth — no SAML required.

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How it works

  1. Admin connects Peoplifi to Google Workspace via OAuth
  2. Peoplifi reads the directory and matches employees by email
  3. Employees click 'Sign in with Google' on the Peoplifi login page
  4. Approved time-off pushes to Google Calendar with configured visibility
  5. Optional: auto-provision new Workspace users as Peoplifi employees

Features

One-click SSO via OAuth 2.0 / OpenID Connect
Auto-provisioning from Google directory
Approved time-off → Google Calendar
Domain-restricted login
Group-based role mapping
Calendar visibility per leave type
SAML 2.0 fallback available

Setup Guide

  1. Settings → Integrations → Google Workspace
  2. Connect to Google as a Workspace super admin
  3. Approve scopes (directory read, calendar write)
  4. Enable auto-provisioning if desired
  5. Optional: map a Google group to Peoplifi Admin role

Frequently Asked Questions

Will it work with Google Workspace Business Starter?

Yes. Any paid Workspace plan works.

How does auto-provisioning handle UAE National employees?

Auto-provisioning treats all Google Workspace users uniformly during account creation — UAE National vs expatriate distinctions are captured in the Peoplifi employee profile (citizenship, GPSSA registration, Emiratisation classification) rather than at the Workspace level. This separation is appropriate given Workspace itself doesn't have an Emiratisation concept.

Can leave events appear in employees' personal calendars?

Yes. Approved leave can be configured to appear on the employee's primary Google Calendar, on their team calendar, or both. Visibility levels are configurable — private, busy-only, or full details — to match the employee's preference and team norms.

What about Google Calendar Resources for meeting rooms?

The Calendar integration writes to employee primary calendars; meeting-room booking remains in Workspace's native Resources framework. Some employers configure room booking to consider HR-tracked leave (e.g., not allowing key employees' absence to overlap with critical room reservations), but that's a manual coordination rather than an automatic integration feature.

Deep dive: Google Workspace

Why Google Workspace SSO matters for UAE teams

Google Workspace is one of the most widely-adopted business productivity suites in the UAE — particularly common in tech, financial services, professional services, and government-adjacent organisations. For HR-tech adoption, integrating with Workspace SSO provides several material benefits: employees sign in to Peoplifi using their existing Workspace credentials (no separate Peoplifi password to remember); auto-provisioning creates Peoplifi accounts automatically when new hires are added to Workspace; deprovisioning suspends Peoplifi access immediately when employees are removed from Workspace; and group-based role mapping lets HR Admins manage Peoplifi permissions through familiar Google groups rather than separate Peoplifi role assignments.

OAuth 2.0 architecture and security

The integration uses OAuth 2.0 / OpenID Connect, the industry standard for federated authentication. When an employee attempts to sign in to Peoplifi, the application redirects to Google for authentication; Google validates the user's credentials and applies any configured Workspace-level security (MFA, location-based restrictions, device-trust); on success, Google returns a signed assertion to Peoplifi which validates and creates a session. The user never enters a Peoplifi-specific password — credentials live exclusively in Workspace. This eliminates password-management overhead, reduces phishing exposure, and ensures access policy is centrally administered through Workspace's security framework.

Calendar integration for UAE-specific workflows

Beyond SSO, the integration writes approved leave to employees' Google Calendars. UAE-specific configuration includes (1) **Friday-Saturday weekend** treatment (post-2022 UAE weekend shift) when computing working-day spans. (2) **UAE federal holidays** (Eid al-Fitr, Eid al-Adha, UAE National Day, Commemoration Day, Islamic New Year, Prophet Muhammad's Birthday) auto-recognised in calendar event creation. (3) **Ramadan-hour adjustments** during the Holy Month — calendar events show the reduced 6-hour day per Article 65. (4) **Visibility configuration** — Free/Busy view appropriate for the UAE professional context where personal-leave details may be sensitive. (5) **Recurring event handling** for Ramadan and other annual cultural observances.

Auto-provisioning and lifecycle automation

Workspace auto-provisioning creates and updates Peoplifi accounts based on Workspace user lifecycle events. (1) **New hire** — employee added to Workspace appears in Peoplifi within minutes with name, email, manager, department mapped from Workspace data. (2) **Update** — Workspace profile changes (manager change, department transfer, title update) flow to Peoplifi automatically. (3) **Suspension** — Workspace account suspension immediately suspends Peoplifi access. (4) **Deletion** — Workspace user deletion suspends Peoplifi (data retained per retention policy). For UAE workforces with high expatriate turnover, this lifecycle automation materially reduces HR-team administrative work and prevents the orphaned-account problem common at less-integrated stacks.

Group-based role mapping

Peoplifi supports mapping Google groups to Peoplifi roles. Common patterns: 'HR Admins' Google group maps to Peoplifi HR Admin role; 'Managers' group maps to Manager role; 'All Employees' group maps to standard Employee role. Multi-entity organisations can use entity-specific groups (e.g., 'Dubai-Mainland Employees' vs 'DIFC-Employees') to apply different jurisdictional rules. As employees move between groups in Workspace — promotions, department transfers, jurisdiction changes — their Peoplifi roles update automatically without HR intervention.

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