How to integrate Workable MCP with Claude Agent SDK

This guide walks you through connecting Workable to the Claude Agent SDK using the Composio tool router. By the end, you'll have a working Workable agent that can list all candidates for open roles, show scheduled interviews for this week, fetch all current job postings through natural language commands. This guide will help you understand how to give your Claude Agent SDK agent real control over a Workable account through Composio's Workable MCP server. Before we dive in, let's take a quick look at the key ideas and tools involved.

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Workable is an all-in-one HR software platform that streamlines hiring, employee management, and payroll. It helps teams simplify recruiting, onboarding, and staff operations in one place.

37 Tools

Introduction

This guide walks you through connecting Workable to the Claude Agent SDK using the Composio tool router. By the end, you'll have a working Workable agent that can list all candidates for open roles, show scheduled interviews for this week, fetch all current job postings through natural language commands.

This guide will help you understand how to give your Claude Agent SDK agent real control over a Workable account through Composio's Workable MCP server.

Before we dive in, let's take a quick look at the key ideas and tools involved.

Also integrate Workable with

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TL;DR

Here's what you'll learn:
  • Get and set up your Claude/Anthropic and Composio API keys
  • Install the necessary dependencies
  • Initialize Composio and create a Tool Router session for Workable
  • Configure an AI agent that can use Workable as a tool
  • Run a live chat session where you can ask the agent to perform Workable operations

What is Claude Agent SDK?

The Claude Agent SDK is Anthropic's official framework for building AI agents powered by Claude. It provides a streamlined interface for creating agents with MCP tool support and conversation management.

Key features include:

  • Native MCP Support: Built-in support for Model Context Protocol servers
  • Permission Modes: Control tool execution permissions
  • Streaming Responses: Real-time response streaming for interactive applications
  • Context Manager: Clean async context management for sessions

What is the Workable MCP server, and what's possible with it?

The Workable MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Workable account. It provides structured and secure access to your hiring and HR data, so your agent can perform actions like listing jobs, managing candidates, retrieving background check info, and organizing departments on your behalf.

  • Comprehensive candidate management: Instantly retrieve and aggregate candidate data across all jobs, making it easy for your agent to analyze talent pipelines, track applicants, and surface top candidates.
  • Job and account insights: Let your agent list all open roles, access job details, and pull account-wide information to keep your hiring team up-to-date and organized.
  • Automated event and interview scheduling: Fetch all scheduled events, interviews, and meetings so your agent can help coordinate calendars and ensure everyone’s on the same page.
  • Background check integration: Retrieve available background check providers and packages, enabling your agent to streamline compliance and onboarding workflows.
  • Team and department organization: List or delete departments, fetch member rosters, and manage legal entities—helping your agent automate org chart updates and keep your HR records tidy.

What is the Composio tool router, and how does it fit here?

What is Composio SDK?

Composio's Composio SDK helps agents find the right tools for a task at runtime. You can plug in multiple toolkits (like Gmail, HubSpot, and GitHub), and the agent will identify the relevant app and action to complete multi-step workflows. This can reduce token usage and improve the reliability of tool calls. Read more here: Getting started with Composio SDK

The tool router generates a secure MCP URL that your agents can access to perform actions.

How the Composio SDK works

The Composio SDK follows a three-phase workflow:

  1. Discovery: Searches for tools matching your task and returns relevant toolkits with their details.
  2. Authentication: Checks for active connections. If missing, creates an auth config and returns a connection URL via Auth Link.
  3. Execution: Executes the action using the authenticated connection.

Step-by-step Guide

Step by step09 STEPS
1

Prerequisites

Before starting, make sure you have:
  • Composio API Key and Claude/Anthropic API Key
  • Primary know-how of Claude Agents SDK
  • A Workable account
  • Some knowledge of Python
2

Getting API Keys for Claude/Anthropic and Composio

Claude/Anthropic API Key
  • Go to the Anthropic Console and create an API key. You'll need credits to use the models.
  • Keep the API key safe.
Composio API Key
  • Log in to the Composio dashboard.
  • Navigate to your API settings and generate a new API key.
  • Store this key securely as you'll need it for authentication.
3

Install dependencies

npm install @anthropic-ai/claude-agent-sdk @composio/core dotenv

Install the Composio SDK and the Claude Agents SDK.

What's happening:

  • @composio/core provides Composio integration for Anthropic
  • @anthropic-ai/claude-agent-sdk is the core agent framework
  • dotenv/config loads environment variables
4

Set up environment variables

bash
COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your_composio_api_key_here
USER_ID=your_user_id_here
ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=your_anthropic_api_key_here

Create a .env file in your project root.

What's happening:

  • COMPOSIO_API_KEY authenticates with Composio
  • USER_ID identifies the user for session management
  • ANTHROPIC_API_KEY authenticates with Anthropic/Claude
5

Import dependencies

import 'dotenv/config';
import readline from 'node:readline';
import { Composio } from '@composio/core';
import { query, type Options } from "@anthropic-ai/claude-agent-sdk";

dotenv.config();
What's happening:
  • We're importing all necessary libraries including the Claude Agent SDK and Composio
  • The dotenv.config() function loads environment variables from your .env file
  • This setup prepares the foundation for connecting Claude with Workable functionality
6

Create a Composio instance and Tool Router session

async function chat() {
  const { COMPOSIO_API_KEY, USER_ID } = process.env;
  if (!COMPOSIO_API_KEY || !USER_ID) {
    throw new Error('COMPOSIO_API_KEY and USER_ID required in .env');
  }

  const composio = new Composio({ apiKey: COMPOSIO_API_KEY });

  // Create Tool Router session for Workable
  const session = await composio.create(USER_ID, {
    toolkits: ['workable'],
  });
  const mcpUrl = session?.mcp.url;
What's happening:
  • The function checks for the required COMPOSIO_API_KEY environment variable
  • We're creating a Composio instance using our API key
  • The create method creates a Tool Router session for Workable
  • The returned url is the MCP server URL that your agent will use
7

Configure Claude Agent with MCP

const options: Options = {
  permissionMode: 'bypassPermissions',
  mcpServers: {
    composio: {
      type: 'http',
      url: mcpUrl,
      headers: { 'x-api-key': COMPOSIO_API_KEY }
    }
  },
  systemPrompt: 'You are a helpful assistant with access to Workable tools via Composio.',
  maxTurns: 10,
};
What's happening:
  • We're configuring the Claude Agent options with the MCP server URL
  • permissionMode: 'bypassPermissions' allows the agent to execute operations without asking for permission each time
  • The system prompt instructs the agent that it has access to Workable
  • maxTurns: 10 limits the conversation length to prevent excessive API usage
8

Create client and start chat loop

const rl = readline.createInterface({
    input: process.stdin,
    output: process.stdout,
    prompt: 'You: '
  });

  console.log('\nChat started. Type "exit" to quit.\n');

  let isProcessing = false;

  async function ask(prompt: string) {
    isProcessing = true;
    rl.pause();

    process.stdout.write('Claude is thinking...');
    const stream = query({ prompt, options });

    let firstChunk = true;
    for await (const msg of stream) {
      const content = (msg as any).message?.content || (msg as any).content;
      if (Array.isArray(content)) {
        for (const block of content) {
          if (block.type === 'text' && block.text) {
            if (firstChunk) {
              process.stdout.write('\r\x1b[K');
              process.stdout.write('Claude: ');
              firstChunk = false;
            }
            process.stdout.write(block.text);
          }
        }
      }
    }
    process.stdout.write('\n\n');

    isProcessing = false;
    rl.resume();
    rl.prompt();
  }

  rl.on('line', async (line) => {
    if (isProcessing) return;

    const input = line.trim();
    if (input === 'exit') {
      rl.close();
      process.exit(0);
    }
    if (input) await ask(input);
    else rl.prompt();
  });

  await ask('What can you help me with?');
}
What's happening:
  • The readline interface is created to handle user input and output
  • The query function is used to send the user's input to the agent
  • The chat loop continues until the user types 'exit' or 'quit'
9

Run the application

try {
  await chat();
} catch (error) {
  console.error(error);
  process.exit(1);
}
What's happening:
  • The chat function is the entry point for the application
  • The try-catch block is used to handle any errors that occur

Complete Code

Here's the complete code to get you started with Workable and Claude Agent SDK:

import 'dotenv/config';
import readline from 'node:readline';
import { Composio } from '@composio/core';
import { query, type Options } from "@anthropic-ai/claude-agent-sdk";

async function chat() {
  const { COMPOSIO_API_KEY, USER_ID } = process.env;
  if (!COMPOSIO_API_KEY || !USER_ID) {
    throw new Error('COMPOSIO_API_KEY and USER_ID required in .env');
  }

  const composio = new Composio({ apiKey: COMPOSIO_API_KEY });
  const session = await composio.create(USER_ID, {
    toolkits: ['workable']
  });
  const mcp_url = session?.mcp.url;

  const options: Options = {
    permissionMode: 'bypassPermissions',
    mcpServers: {
      composio: {
        type: 'http',
        url: mcp_url,
        headers: { 'x-api-key': COMPOSIO_API_KEY }
      }
    },
    systemPrompt: 'You are a helpful assistant with access to Workable tools via Composio.',
    maxTurns: 10,
  };

  const rl = readline.createInterface({
    input: process.stdin,
    output: process.stdout,
    prompt: 'You: '
  });

  console.log('\nChat started. Type "exit" to quit.\n');

  let isProcessing = false;

  async function ask(prompt: string) {
    isProcessing = true;
    rl.pause();

    process.stdout.write('Claude is thinking...');
    const stream = query({ prompt, options });

    let firstChunk = true;
    for await (const msg of stream) {
      const content = (msg as any).message?.content || (msg as any).content;
      if (Array.isArray(content)) {
        for (const block of content) {
          if (block.type === 'text' && block.text) {
            if (firstChunk) {
              process.stdout.write('\r\x1b[K');
              process.stdout.write('Claude: ');
              firstChunk = false;
            }
            process.stdout.write(block.text);
          }
        }
      }
    }
    process.stdout.write('\n\n');

    isProcessing = false;
    rl.resume();
    rl.prompt();
  }

  rl.on('line', async (line) => {
    if (isProcessing) return;

    const input = line.trim();
    if (input === 'exit') {
      rl.close();
      process.exit(0);
    }
    if (input) await ask(input);
    else rl.prompt();
  });

  await ask('What can you help me with?');
}

try {
  await chat();
} catch (error) {
  console.error(error);
  process.exit(1);
}

Conclusion

You've successfully built a Claude Agent SDK agent that can interact with Workable through Composio's Tool Router.

Key features:

  • Native MCP support through Claude's agent framework
  • Streaming responses for real-time interaction
  • Permission bypass for smooth automated workflows
You can extend this by adding more toolkits, implementing custom business logic, or building a web interface around the agent.
TOOLS

Supported Tools

Every Workable action and event your agent gets out of the box.

Create Employee

Tool to create an employee in your Workable account.

Delete Department

Tool to delete a department.

Delete Subscription

Tool to unsubscribe from an event by deleting a webhook subscription.

Get Account

Tool to return the specified account.

Get Accounts

Retrieves all Workable accounts (organizations) accessible to the authenticated user.

Get Background Check Packages

Tool to retrieve a list of available background check packages from a specified provider.

Get Background Check Providers

Retrieves a list of background check providers integrated with your Workable account.

Get Candidates

Retrieve a list of candidates across all jobs in the organization.

Get Employee

Tool to retrieve detailed information for a specific employee by ID.

Get Events

Retrieve a collection of scheduled events (calls, interviews, meetings) from the Workable account.

Get Jobs

Retrieves a paginated list of jobs from your Workable account.

Get Legal Entities

Tool to retrieve a collection of your account legal entities.

Get Members

Retrieve a paginated list of Workable account members with their roles and permissions.

Get recruiters

Retrieves external recruiters from your Workable account.

Get Requisitions

Tool to retrieve a collection of requisitions in the account.

Get Stages

Tool to retrieve a collection of your recruitment pipeline stages.

Get Subscriptions

Retrieves all webhook subscriptions configured in your Workable account.

List Custom Attributes

Tool to retrieve all custom attributes configured in the Workable account.

List Departments

Tool to retrieve all departments from your Workable account.

List Disqualification Reasons

Tool to retrieve a collection of account's disqualification reasons.

List Employee Fields

Tool to retrieve a collection of your account's employee field definitions.

List Employees

Tool to retrieve a collection of account employees.

List Permission Sets

Tool to retrieve a collection of your account permission sets.

List Public Jobs

Tool to return a collection of public jobs for an account.

List Public Locations

Tool to retrieve a collection of locations where a Workable account has public job postings.

List Time Off Balances

Retrieves all time off balances for an employee across all time off categories.

List Time Off Categories

Tool to retrieve all time off categories configured for your account.

List Work Schedules

Tool to retrieve a collection of work schedules configured in your Workable account.

Update Background Check Status

Updates the status and results of an existing background check in a candidate's timeline.

Merge Department

Tool to merge a department into another.

Create Department

Tool to create a department in your account.

Enable Member

Enable (restore) a deactivated Workable account member to active status.

Invite Member

Tool to invite a member to your Workable account.

Update Department

Tool to update an existing department in your account.

Update Member

Updates a Workable account member's details including roles, name, headline, email, and collaboration rules.

Update Employee

Tool to update an existing employee in Workable.

Upload Employee Documents

Tool to upload a list of documents for a specific employee.

FRAMEWORKS

How to build Workable MCP Agent with another framework

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OpenAI Agents SDK

Use Workable MCP with OpenAI Agents SDK

Claude Code logo

Claude Code

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Claude Cowork logo

Claude Cowork

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Codex logo

Codex

Use Workable MCP with Codex

OpenClaw logo

OpenClaw

Use Workable MCP with OpenClaw

Hermes logo

Hermes

Use Workable MCP with Hermes

CLI logo

CLI

Use Workable MCP with CLI

Google ADK logo

Google ADK

Use Workable MCP with Google ADK

LangChain logo

LangChain

Use Workable MCP with LangChain

Vercel AI SDK logo

Vercel AI SDK

Use Workable MCP with Vercel AI SDK

Mastra AI logo

Mastra AI

Use Workable MCP with Mastra AI

LlamaIndex logo

LlamaIndex

Use Workable MCP with LlamaIndex

CrewAI logo

CrewAI

Use Workable MCP with CrewAI

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

With a standalone Workable MCP server, the agents and LLMs can only access a fixed set of Workable tools tied to that server. However, with the Composio Tool Router, agents can dynamically load tools from Workable and many other apps based on the task at hand, all through a single MCP endpoint.

Yes, you can. Claude Agent SDK fully supports MCP integration. You get structured tool calling, message history handling, and model orchestration while Tool Router takes care of discovering and serving the right Workable tools.

Yes, absolutely. You can configure which Workable scopes and actions are allowed when connecting your account to Composio. You can also bring your own OAuth credentials or API configuration so you keep full control over what the agent can do.

All sensitive data such as tokens, keys, and configuration is fully encrypted at rest and in transit. Composio is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and follows strict security practices so your Workable data and credentials are handled as safely as possible.

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Karan skipped his own birthday party to fix our critical issue. It was 10pm and he diverted his Waymo to help us instead. This really sets the bar — it shows the commitment you need when users rely on your software.

Harsha Gaddipati
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Co-founder, Slashy

A lot of students tell us that the moment their connected tools start talking to each other inside Opennote feels almost magical. The agent just knows them, and it's immensely helped keep new users on the platform.

Abhi Arya
Abhi Arya
Co-founder, Opennote

We chose Composio over Pipedream because it delivered depth where it mattered — niche tools and tricky edge cases other platforms simply ignored. That gave us confidence to scale without compromising.

Nirman Dave
Nirman Dave
CEO, Zams

As a solo builder, shipping fast is life or death. The only way I can outcompete incumbents is by outmanoeuvring them. Getting bogged down managing agent auth would have been a death sentence.

Ryan Yu
Ryan Yu
Founder, Extra Thursday

Before Composio, adding tool integrations was slow and resource-intensive. Each one could take weeks of engineering time, and maintaining them meant constantly keeping up with API changes.

Tomisin Jenrola
Tomisin Jenrola
Founder & CEO, SwarmZero

With hands-on help from their founder, we integrated Gmail and Google Drive in just 30 minutes. This level of personal support and commitment is exactly what startups should strive for.

Jerome Leclanche
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Co-Founder, Ingram Technologies