Sydney Tech Leaders Code of Conduct - Reporting Guide

Making a report

If you believe that someone is violating the code of conduct we ask that you report it to by STL organisers, either in person or via our email contact at sydneytechleaders@gmail.com. All reports will be kept confidential. In some cases where we determine that a public statement is required, the identities of all victims and reporters will remain confidential unless those individuals instruct us otherwise.

If you believe anyone is in physical danger, please notify law enforcement first.

If you are unsure if the incident is a violation, or whether the space where it occurred is covered by the STL Code of Conduct, we encourage you to still report it. We believe it is better to discover an incident is not a violation than to not discover a violation. We will not judge you in any way for good faith reporting of an incident that is found to not be a violation. We believe that knowing about incidents that are not violations or occur outside of spaces covered by our code of conduct aid in improving or Code of Conduct and the processes surrounding it.

In your report please include:

• Your contact information, so we can remain in contact with you and followup if required
• Names (real, nicknames, or pseudonyms) of any individuals involved. If there were other witnesses besides yourself, please try to include them as well.
• When and where the incident took place. Please be as specific as possible.
• Your account of the incident. If a public record exists, such as a mailing list archive or logs of an online forum, please include a link, or screenshots if appropriate and relevant.
• Any context to the incident that you believe is appropriate
• If you believe the incident is ongoing
• Any other information you believe we should have.

What happens after you make the report?

You will receive an email from the organisers of Sydney Tech Leaders acknowledging receipt immediately. We promise to acknowledge receipt within 24 hours, and aim for much quicker that that.

The Organisers of Sydney Tech Leaders will immediately meet to review the incident and determine:

• what happened,
• whether the event constitutes a code of conduct violation,
• who, if anyone, was the bad actor, and
• whether this is an ongoing situation and/or if there is a threat to anyone’s safety.

If this is an ongoing incident or a threat to someone’s safety, the immediate priority of the organisers will be to protect everyone involved. This may mean we delay an “offical” response until we believe the situation has ended and that all parties are safe.

Once the organisers have a complete accounting of the events they will make a decision as to how to respond. Responses may include:

• Taking no further action if it is determined that no violation occurred.
• A private reprimand from the organisers to the individual(s) involved.
• A public reprimand.
• An imposed suspension from spaces covered by the Code of Conduct.
• A permanent ban from spaces covered by the Code of Conduct.
• A request for a private apology.
• A request for a public apology.

We will respond within one week to the person who filed the report with a resolution or an explanation for why the situation is not yet resolved.

Once we have determined our final action we will contact the original reporter to let them know what action we will be taking, if any. We will take into account feedback from the reporter on the appropriateness of our response, but may not act upon it.

We may choose to make a final report on the situation to our community.

Appealing

Any of the parties directly involved or affected may request a reconsideration of the organisers’ decision. The organisers may, with the permission of the victims and reporters, request input from external sources while reviewing the appeal.

This reporting guide is in part derived from the Django Code of Conduct - Reporting Guide and the Ruby Australia Code of Conduct Reporting Guide, and is otherwise influenced by the Geek Feminism Conference anti-harassment policy. This guide is licensed under the Creative Commons — CC0 1.0 Universal license.