I cant see other online people in my clan

[H3avy]

To be more specific, I can see them being online and talking in clan chat but cant click to see their character unless I have them in my friends list. Is this the way it is supposed to work or do I have to enable something to see their characters and join their fireteam without adding them to my friends list.

[Animeye]

It isn't the way it is supposed to be working (based on how things worked back on Bnet). However this has been a longstanding bug since the Steam release, with seemingly both Bungie and Steam pointing at each other saying it is their fault (a bit of searching and you will find people who talked with support on both sides getting directed to talk to the other support).

Some people have claimed that if both people have their Steam profiles set to public then things will work, but I haven't had any success with that.
Others have claimed to have success using a Steam Group. Add clan members to the Steam group and it should work. You may need to also open up a group chat with the Steam group.