Settings
Settings control how Plenar schedules work and how your team is configured.
Scheduling constraints
These settings live in the Schedule panel or project settings. They directly affect scheduling behavior.
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Auto-assignment | Off | When on, Plenar assigns unassigned tasks to team members. Without this, unassigned tasks are not scheduled. |
| Skill-based scheduling | Off | Enables skill constraints during auto-assignment. Tasks with required skills are only assigned to qualified members. |
| Skill matching mode | Partial | Controls strictness. Required: no match = not scheduled. Partial: always schedules, prefers matches. Preferred: like partial, plus optimizes preferred skill matches. |
| Allow parallel work | Off | Whether one person can work on multiple tasks simultaneously. When off, each member works on one task at a time. |
| Max concurrent items | 1 | When parallel work is on, how many tasks a person can work on simultaneously. |
| Capacity buffer | 10% | Inflates estimates before scheduling. A 3-day task becomes 3.3 days. Provides margin for estimation error. |
| Lead time | 5 days | Tasks within this many working days of their scheduled start resist rescheduling. Prevents Plenar from moving imminent work. |
| Reassignment mode | Stable | Stable: auto-assigned tasks keep their assignee across runs. Fresh: auto-assigned tasks are re-optimized every run. Stable reduces noise; fresh finds better solutions. |
| Prioritize committed milestones | On | Milestones with in-progress work get priority treatment. Reduces context-switching by finishing started work first. |
| ETA threshold | 5 days | How many days a goal can slip before Plenar expands its optimization scope to recover the deadline. |
| Override lead time for at-risk goals | Off | When on, allows Plenar to reschedule lead-time-protected tasks if needed to meet at-risk goal deadlines. |
When to adjust each setting
Auto-assignment — Turn on when your team is large enough that manually assigning every task is tedious. Turn off for small teams where you want full control over who does what.
Skill-based scheduling — Turn on when your team has specialized roles (frontend, backend, design) and you want Plenar to respect those specializations. Leave off for generalist teams.
Skill matching mode — Use Required when expertise is non-negotiable (e.g., security reviews). Use Partial (default) for most teams. Use Preferred when you want to optimize matches without hard constraints.
Allow parallel work — Turn on for roles that genuinely multitask (e.g., a tech lead who reviews PRs while coding). Leave off for focused individual contributors.
Capacity buffer — Increase if your team consistently underestimates (e.g., 15-20% for teams new to estimation). Decrease if estimates are reliable and you want tighter scheduling.
Lead time — Increase for teams that need more stability (e.g., 10 days if context-switching is expensive). Decrease if your team is comfortable with last-minute schedule changes.
Reassignment mode — Use Fresh after team changes (new member joins, someone leaves, major reorg). Use Stable for day-to-day operations to minimize churn.
Prioritize committed milestones — Leave on unless you want Plenar to freely reorder work across milestones. Turn off if milestone boundaries are soft and you care more about global throughput.
ETA threshold — Increase if minor slips are acceptable and you want less aggressive recovery (e.g., 10 days). Decrease if deadlines are firm and you want Plenar to react to small delays (e.g., 2 days).
Override lead time for at-risk goals — Turn on before a deadline crunch when meeting the goal is more important than schedule stability. Turn off for normal operations.
Scheduling templates
Templates are presets for secondary scheduling priorities. Meeting P0/P1/P2 deadlines is always the top priority, regardless of template. Templates control what Plenar optimizes for after satisfying deadlines.
| Template | Optimizes for | Best when |
|---|---|---|
| Deadline Driven (default) | Meeting deadlines with strong skill matching | You have clear deadlines and want them respected above all else |
| Throughput | Minimizing total project duration | Shipping fast is more important than meeting a specific date |
| Team Balanced | Even work distribution across the team | Fairness matters, or you want to avoid overloading specific people |
| Quality First | Maximizing skill-to-task fit | Specialized work where having the right person matters more than speed |
You can switch templates at any time. The change goes through the change impact preview, so you see the impact before committing.
When to adjust: Switch to Throughput before a deadline crunch when you need to ship fast. Switch to Team Balanced for long-running projects where sustainable pace matters. Switch to Quality First during architecture or security-critical phases. See Scheduling Templates for detailed guidance.
Integrations
| Integration | What it does |
|---|---|
| Google Calendar | Syncs time off from calendar events to Plenar availability. Configured per user. |
| Google Docs | Link documents to tasks for traceability. |
| Jira | Import tasks from Jira projects. |
| SCIM | Automated user provisioning from your identity provider. |
Configure integrations in Settings > Integrations. See Integrations guide for setup details.
Organization settings
Members
Manage organization members, roles, and invitations. Members can be assigned to multiple projects. Organization admins can invite new members and manage roles.
Availability types
Configure the time-off types available to your organization. Each type defines:
- Label — human-readable name (PTO, Sick, On-Call, etc.)
- Capacity effect — zero (0%) or a percentage reduction (e.g., 50% for on-call)
- Enabled — whether it appears as an option when logging time off
Custom types let you model your team’s specific patterns: interview duty, hack weeks, management overhead.
Data sources
Configure external data sources for calendar sync (Google Calendar), directory sync, and time tracking integrations.
API tokens
Each project can have API tokens for MCP and programmatic access.
- Go to Settings > API Tokens
- Click Generate Token
- Set a name (e.g., “Claude Code”) and role
- Copy the token — it is shown only once
Token roles
| Role | Preview changes | Apply changes | Manage settings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Planner | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Contributor | Yes | No | No |
Use Planner for Claude Code sessions where you want the agent to apply changes autonomously. Use Contributor if you want Claude to preview changes but require you to apply them from the dashboard.
See Connect Claude Code for how to use tokens with Claude Code.