Find and filter people
Find a person, save reusable filters, check a Planning Center list, and export your current audience.
Open People in the organization you want to work with. Your organization roles, data permissions, and giving access determine the information available to you. See Access, roles, and giving permissions if you need help checking access.
Find a person
- Open People and enter their name in Search people....
- Check Status if the person is missing. The directory starts with Active people; include Inactive when needed. Selecting both statuses shows All.
- Select the person's name to open their full profile and available tabs.
The status-filter reset restores Active. A person absent from the current results may be outside your search, status selection, filters, list, or access.
Read Read a person profile for the profile's activity, engagement, and restricted-data states.
Filter an audience
Use Add filter to choose a field and complete its condition. Add conditions or rules when you need several criteria, and choose how they combine. Review the resulting people before using the audience for a report or follow-up.
Status is a separate control. Check it alongside the filter rules; a rule about attendance or a group does not automatically include inactive people.
Available fields depend on the data connected to your organization and your permissions. Complete a condition's required values before saving it; unfinished conditions are dropped when you save a segment.
Save and reopen a segment
A saved segment stores reusable filter rules and the status choice. Its results can change as the underlying people and activity change. Search text is temporary and is not saved as part of the segment.
Prepare your filters
Build the audience with filter rules and Status. If you used search to find a person, use a filter condition for criteria you want to preserve.
Save the segment
Select Save Segment. Enter a Name, optionally add a Description, then select Save Segment in the dialog.
Reopen it
Select the segment in the People sidebar. On a smaller screen, open Segments to see saved segments and Planning Center lists.
Review later changes
Changing a selected segment's rules can expose Update Segment. Use it to save those changes, or Save as New to create a separate segment.
Wait for a successful save before treating the segment as stored. If saving fails, review the error and your completed conditions, then try again.
People opened from a report can be restricted to that report's audience. Use the regular People directory when you need its segment-saving controls.
Use a Planning Center list
Select a Planning Center list from the People sidebar or Segments panel. The displayed audience comes from that list's synced membership. The ordinary search and filter controls are unavailable while viewing a Planning Center list.
A Planning Center list and a Parable segment are maintained in different places:
| Audience | Where its definition comes from |
|---|---|
| Parable saved segment | Filter rules and status choices saved in Parable. |
| Planning Center list | A list maintained and refreshed in Planning Center, then synced into Parable. |
Check list freshness
Read the freshness information beside the selected list:
| State | What to do |
|---|---|
| Checking | The freshness request is still running. |
| Check unavailable | Parable could not check freshness. You can still use an available Sync action. |
| Out of date | Planning Center has a newer snapshot. Select Sync when available to copy it into Parable. |
| In sync | Parable matches the current Planning Center snapshot. Review the snapshot's age if the audience looks old. |
In sync can still refer to an old Planning Center snapshot. Refresh the list in Planning Center first, then sync it in Parable. Syncing alone copies the available snapshot; it does not rebuild Planning Center's list.
When available, select Sync and wait for completion. Syncing… indicates an active request. List sync complete confirms success; a failed sync needs attention and does not confirm that membership was refreshed.
Export the audience
- Review the current search, filters, status, or Planning Center list.
- Choose the columns you need in the table's column selector.
- Select Export CSV and wait for the export to finish.
CSV export uses the current audience and chosen columns. Checking individual rows does not narrow this CSV export. Review the current audience before sharing the file, including the giving information your access permits.
An export can contain at most 10,000 people. If Parable warns that the export was truncated, the file contains only the first 10,000 results. Narrow your audience and export again before treating the file as the complete list.
If Column options couldn't be loaded appears, the directory can still show names, but column selection and CSV export remain unavailable until the field catalogue loads. Refresh and try again.
Lists, reports, and PDF exports
Segments and Planning Center lists define audiences. Reports provide an analysis or formatted output for an audience. A saved segment does not create a report by itself.
Export PDF opens the template workflow for People. Choose an available template and review its audience before generating the report. Checking rows narrows this PDF export to those selected people. For a report you have already created, return to Reports and open the work you can access.
When results are missing
- Confirm your selected organization, status, audience, and search or filters.
- For a Planning Center list, check both its snapshot age and Parable's sync.
- Let loading finish before interpreting an empty table as an empty audience.
- Review a failed request as a load error, then retry or ask your team manager about access and integration availability.