Code of Conduct - Reporting Guide

Ruby Australia's Code of Conduct - Reporting Guide

Version: 0.4 (2018-05-17)

Making a report

If you believe someone is violating the code of conduct we ask that you report it to:

Event organisers should be your first port of call, where applicable, as they are onsite and empowered to resolve issues quickly. Event organisers will be identified at the start of the event, and/or made identifiable by special t-shirts or lanyards; a phone number may also be provided for reporting purposes at some events.

All reports will be kept confidential. In some cases we may determine that a public statement will need to be made. If that's the case, 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 appropriate law enforcement first. If you are unsure what law enforcement agency is appropriate, please include this in your report and we will attempt to notify them.

If you are unsure whether the incident is a violation, or whether the space where it happened is covered by the Code of Conduct, we encourage you to still report it. We would much rather have a few extra reports where we decide to take no action, rather than miss a report of an actual violation. We do not look negatively on you if we find the incident is not a violation. And knowing about incidents that are not violations, or happen outside our spaces, can also help us to improve the Code of Conduct or the processes surrounding it.

In your report please include:

  • Your contact info (so we can get in touch with you if we need to follow up).
  • Names (real, nicknames, or pseudonyms) of any individuals involved. If there were other witnesses besides you, please try to include them as well.
  • When and where the incident occurred. Please be as specific as possible.
  • Your account of what occurred. If there is a publicly available record (e.g. a mailing list archive or a public IRC logger) please include a link; if screenshots would be relevant please include them.
  • Any extra context you believe existed for the incident.
  • If you believe this incident is ongoing.
  • Any other information you believe we should have.

What happens after you make a report?

You will receive an email from the Ruby Australia Disciplinary Subcommittee ("the subcommittee”) acknowledging receipt immediately. We promise to acknowledge receipt within 24 hours (and will aim for much quicker than that).

The subcommittee will immediately meet to review the incident and determine:

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

If this is determined to be an ongoing incident or a threat to physical safety, the subcommittee’s immediate priority will be to protect everyone involved. This means we may delay an "official" response until we believe that the situation has ended and that everyone is physically safe.

Once the subcommittee has a complete account of the events they will make a decision as to how to response. Responses may include:

  • Taking no further action (if it is determined that no violation occurred).
  • A private reprimand from the subcommittee to the individual(s) involved.
  • A public reprimand.
  • An imposed vacation (i.e. asking someone to "take a week off" from Ruby Down Under or the Ruby AU Slack).
  • A permanent or temporary ban from some or all Ruby Australia spaces (Slack, forums, meetups, camps & conferences, etc.).
  • A request for a public or private apology.
  • Revocation of Ruby AU membership, including voting rights.

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

Once we've determined our final action, we'll contact the original reporter to let them know what action (if any) we'll be taking. We'll take into account feedback from the reporter on the appropriateness of our response, but we don't guarantee we'll act on it.

Finally, the subcommittee will make a report on the situation to the Ruby Australia committee. The committee may choose to make a public report of the incident.

Appealing

Only permanent resolutions (such as bans) may be appealed. To appeal a decision of the subcommittee, contact the Ruby Australia committee at committee@ruby.org.au with your appeal and the committee will review the case.

License and attribution

This reporting guide is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license.

Portions of text derived from the Django Code of Conduct Reporting Guide.