 Hello everyone. I'm Kirsten. You can find me on github and dripple.org under bendygirl. And this is about enforcing your code of conduct. There aren't very many people in here, so what I would suggest is that you all move forward. And the reason I'm suggesting this is that way it'll be a little bit easier to ask questions. Now, I no longer have access to my notes. So we're going to do the best we can with my memory. So the first thing I want to do is tell you that everything that I'm going to talk about today is related to our event. We have actually had violations of our code of conduct. And I'm going to go through, for the most part, how we handle them. Oh, and session submissions are open. So feel free to actually submit a session. Next, this slide is very specific. The reason we have a code of conduct is because you can't tolerate the intolerant, whether it's bad behavior or criminal activity. To be honest with you, you are going to have to deal with this. I really like how Karl Poplar says this, too. So if you haven't actually read this, I highly recommend going out and reading Karl Poplar. The next thing I have to point out is that we run a government conference, for the most part. It really is only about half of us who are government employees. But because it's government related or government adjacent, we have more than just a code of conduct that we have to abide by. We also have, as you can see on the screen, the Office of Government Ethics and the Office of Special Counsel. And they control everything related to how a government employee, while on government travel or government work, behaves in a public setting. So those are a lot of fun to learn about, being facetious. So what we're going to talk about today is how we report or receive reports of violations, as well as how we communicate with both, with everyone involved in an issue, how we take action, and then again, how we communicate that afterwards. So violations and how to report them. We start our process by making sure it's really clear that there is only one point of contact. So at any of our events, we have one point of contact. If you can provide an anonymous way of reporting instances that makes it clear what actually happened, you can do that, too. We try not to do that. We think the personal touch is a little bit better, and oftentimes for someone who's felt violated, it's a lot easier for them to talk to someone or to write it down and then give it to someone. The most important thing that we do when taking a report of a violation is this one. I always ask them how they're doing. It is a small courtesy, but it actually starts to help someone break down exactly what happened. We will get into that in a second. I have a couple of do's and don'ts of how to take a report. I think these are for the most part somewhat explanatory. I listen. I'm the one who usually has to take the violation report. So I listen. I take notes and I ask questions. Those are the very obvious ones that I think everyone knows about. But I offer a timeline. So depending on what the issue is going to be, I offer to them, here's how I'm going to proceed. I want you to understand exactly where we're going with your report. Then I offer them my contact information and anyone else who's going to be in a line of command. A lot of people who work on the organizing committee for GovCon never hear about the violations of code of conduct. Sometimes you will if you're in the line of command. If it was your session or if it was your part of the day where it was an activity took place or you were responsible for the lunch and it happened at lunch, you'll be included in that report. We also make sure that we provide communication to them going forward. So if I'm going on vacation and someone else is going to have to follow up, I make sure that the person who's reporting gets that information as well. When necessary, this hasn't been necessary for us yet. I'm hoping it never will be. You should also contact the police. So always have that in the back pocket. What you should never do. When you are listening, please keep your mouth shut. When you are listening, do not make excuses for whatever activity has taken place. When you are taking notes, don't make assumptions. Take only down the facts. Don't ever leave the person who is sitting there reporting an issue. Don't leave them hanging. Don't just let them flounder. When you offer solutions, don't ever offer a solution at the initial reporting. You can offer timelines. Here's how we're going to proceed. Don't tell them or even ask them what that solution should be. Because if I'm reporting an incident where someone has called me a name, let's say for instance I got called bitch at a happy hour. If that were to occur, I don't think I should tell you how you should handle this. If that happened here at Drupalcon, I shouldn't go to Drupalcon, the Drupal Association, and say, I want this person banned. It's not up to me how you handle your code of conduct as a reporter. It's up to you, and you should have all this in writing beforehand, how you're going to handle that incident. One last thing that I think is really, really important, you're there just to take notes, to understand the person speaking. Do not ever take sides. Let's talk some communication stuff. So one of the big things that we do at our event is before every keynote, we make sure everyone understands our code of conduct. It is a living document. We edit it frequently. In addition to that, we forward it to everyone who is coming to the event, in addition to requiring them at registration to notify us that they have actually read the code of conduct. We also explain on the first day before keynote how to find me to report a violation. We also make sure that the point person, let's say for instance, I am not available that day. We make sure that everyone knows who that point person is for the day. And we also remind people that after parties are also part of our code of conduct. So something that is going to happen in an after party, yep, still part of us. And if you can't control your guests at your after party, you will not be allowed to have another one. How do we take action? This is purposely black. The most important thing about taking action is that this isn't about you. Don't take anything personally. You really need to take yourself out of the whole equation. This is about the person who has been violated. And it's really, really important for them to understand you are there to listen to them. So again, this is not about you. Don't offer any excuses. Don't offer any solutions. You have one job is to protect your community, whether it's your community event, our community half day, even a webinar, or the happy hours because you want to have a happy hour afterwards. If you can't protect those activities by protecting the person who's reporting, you shouldn't be having these events. So having said that really dire warning, I also want to point you to XKCD, I can never remember the names of the letters. Not everyone is a murderer. Not everyone who's coming to your venue is evil. Most of the people are not evil. In the time that we have had Govcon running for this will be our seventh year. This is your eighth year. Yeah, this is technically your eighth year. We've only had three incidents. That could be because people aren't reporting because they're afraid or they think they can handle it themselves. Or this could be that we have really amazing people who are not murderers. When you do take action, make sure that you stick to the timeline that you have already outlined for the person who's reported. I also think it's really important that you understand that it's going to be awkward. You're going to hear stuff that you don't want to hear. Again, reminder, this isn't about you. So you're going to have awkward conversations, whether it's with the person who's reporting or the person or persons who have caused an issue. There will be awkward conversations. Additionally, you need to check back. And this when I say check back, I don't mean just with the person who's reported. You have to check back with the person who's also had a violation. And in some cases, that might be a sponsor to your event. You have to be able to report back to everyone involved, including the people who are on your team who need to know. And then of course, rinse and repeat because everybody has to do that with shampoo, right? So whatever steps you're trying to take to make sure that your community is safe, you're going to have to continue to do these every time you take an action. So pointing out again, yes, this was intended. Because every time we do one of our events, we communicate again. We communicate our code of conduct. We communicate with everyone involved. Exactly what is to be expected at our events. And it's really important to us. Everyone feels safe and welcome and can contribute. And of course, this is the regular. Hey, don't forget about sprints on Friday. I wanted to leave plenty of time for us to have a conversation with anyone who has questions. If you're running an event, or you're trying to enforce a code of conduct, let's go ahead and have some awkward conversations. And yes, I will tell you some generalities about the situations we've run into if that is of interest to the attendees. If you're going to ask a question, you do have to use the mic so everyone back home can also participate in this. So I'm going to open it up to the floor now. I should also ask how many of you raise a hand actually run events. Okay, good to know. You probably are really interested in this topic. All right, questions. You do have to do the microphone. So I came from a company that was very open source when I first went there. They have transitioned over the last five years and are becoming very enterprise. With that, you get a bunch of people coming from very corporate enterprise companies. And last year, our code of conduct manager, who was in the community team, got removed from the code of conduct by leaders in the company without any communication to anyone. And the leaders felt like the leaders should be the ones responsible, even though they don't have a touch with open source community. That was a huge concern of mine as the event manager. Because our community, in my opinion, always comes first. How do you get enterprise leaders, as your company grows, to really understand the importance of this? Because it's very, it was very alien to them. And they just, they didn't understand it. And I still don't think they do. So again, I work for the government. And one of the things that we have to do in government is constantly get training for government ethics and all of the rules related to our special counsel, which is how we are permitted to behave in a public setting. If you have folks who are coming from an enterprise setting who aren't going through those things, I would suggest that you take a look at the information that's available on these two sites on OGE and on OSC. Both of those sites provide a lot of information about not only training in this respect, but additionally, they have some really nice case studies for how they have actually dealt with issues between management and employees as violations of both law as well as regulations. So it's, I think it's helpful to be able to provide that information to your senior management. And to do this in a concerted way, I would prep some sort of a three minute, here's the reasons we're going to need to do this. Because you're not just protecting the community in that respect, you have to protect the company too. And they need to understand that it's twofold. Because if you're going to go enterprise, you want to do it that way, and not be as open sourcey, you're going to need to do a lot more of this. And hey, the government is here to help you because we've had to do it ourselves. At least we have enough employees to show the need for that. I'd also say reach out to me. I can probably help you with how to do that first ask and that first couple of minutes of presentation to them. Happy to help. Hey, don't be shy. Come on, everyone. Alright, so speaking on you were talking about how sometimes you will have awkward conversations with the reporters. What's some what are some tips or advice? In terms of trying to communicate with people that you know, you may have that awkward situation with. So a few years ago, one of our keynotes was propositioned at a happy hour event that we ran. Let me go back to that other slide. And she came up to me afterwards and talked to me directly about what had happened and refused to tell me a lot of information. There's only so much you can do when you don't have everything you need. So the awkward conversation ends up being that you don't have all of the information. How I handle that particular situation was we provided let's call it a remedy. We were part of our process came out of that incident. Now we do a lot more communication around what our code of conduct is and what a violation looks like. And we do a better job of communicating. So when another incident arose, we were able to talk to the person who had the issue and the person who was trying to report. And the awkward. How do I tell an awkward story about an awkward conversation? I think I take a lot. A lot of the training I've received over the years from government on on ethics and rules like that. So when when I say you have to take yourself out of the equation to have that awkward conversation and take notes, that tends to be what I do. I I try to make sure that if like with the situation with our keynote, it was horrifying to me that we could have someone who we paid for their travel to be treated like that was just just nonsensical. And having to have that conversation with her and then go around and talk to the sponsor who clearly was the issue, even though I was not I was not told exactly who it was. It wasn't as awkward as it could have been because it wasn't about me. It was about the community and being able to say to the sponsor you either resolve this issue with your internal employees, you will not be allowed to come back next year. And up with the next day, it's totally fine. No no more problems with them. And this has been several years. So I think just removing yourself from it and remembering that it's not about you really does help. Because otherwise you're going to end up crying and all upset when they're reporting to you and you really can't. You need them to be upset. Let let them have their emotional moment. You really can't take sides. I'd like to expand on that as well and say having patience and empathy and showing your empathy and realizing everybody is human and everybody makes mistakes. Also dealing with the person who is reported. That also helps remembering they're all everybody's human. Yeah, be patient. Yes, people are not usually murderers. We'll go back to that. Add one more thing to that. So because I am emotional and I think that you know is helpful but sometimes can be you know not helpful at the same time. I always choose one other human that I think is very even keeled that is confidential where I can call them at any time and they will pick up and then they will give me a second opinion on maybe what I should or shouldn't do if I have any questions and then that genius of a human can help me have some clarity on what I shouldn't shouldn't say. Anybody want to add please do. I'm sure we've all had to have awkward conversations and it is helpful to know how everybody else deals with them. Good afternoon. Just from some mediation training that I did a while back for the city I live in providing the opportunity for each party to speak and be heard and to present their side of the story. Not just having those awkward conversations be really heavy-handed or one-sided and making sure that each perspective is heard I think is very important. Come on up. Describe a little bit what happened last year right before Baltimore and how it affected the code of conduct. So the triple we'll call it triple drama actually did not have any effects on our individual code of conduct for our event because we have a pretty robust code of conduct and code of ethics from the US government that we abide by. It makes it we're a little bit I think more stringent on making sure everybody understands their code of conduct probably because of all of the required government regulations and stuff around it. So no we didn't even update our code of conduct after that which probably sounds weird right. You're all probably like mine and that really needs a new code of conduct. We know we've been running our code of conduct for years. It's not new. We start with the triple code of conduct triple con code of conduct and we edit it for our needs and re-edit it as well because again it's a living document. So as situations occur you're going to have to go back and actually update that. Nobody else. Feel free to ping me anytime and I believe the next thing that's coming in this room might be the camp organizers. Yes the camp organizers session. Thank you everyone. It's so great. Actually we're trying to divide and conquer and so he wanted me to. Is he here? He is here. Oh my God I haven't seen him in a while. So he presented the answer back by one. Oh I did too. And that's why you were doing that. Yes. And that's for his day. And the whole day. Yes. The whole day. But he wanted me to be a hug and the next time. Aww. And it's just very so but I do how do you intake? So like I don't more like not massively go to combat. Have been in situations where people trust me and tell me things that they wish could be different. I didn't take that next step. And take that. Take that next step. In a way that is respectful of people's privacy but So oftentimes people who find themselves in a situation like that don't realize that. They don't realize that there are these these things out there. I would say searchers these things are that you find them. And then you can actually determine There's levels right? There are always whether it's just your manager or specifically going through like an EO type issue. If the person is in a union I highly recognize. If it was in a union it was so much easier. Right. There's just like so many they dealt with it before they know how to deal with it. So again it might have some case studies in there which is through the EO process. Especially they're dealing with another contractor like your company. It's like more sterile. Also like one of my friends I used to work in Mexico City fired because essentially she had a child. Yeah. Like I listen I intake and I try to It's passed over promotion because I had a small child. Yeah. Technically a protected class. So there's no end to it. On the other hand you know I have to be something outside of government. Not to be a personal. I am a hired emotional being. Especially when it's people that I care about. It's like. I'm a. So rattles for my friends. Right. So, so very much. I totally understand your years of dealing with these things. I actually used to work on suicide hotline. So I am way better at this than I used to be. Yeah. Thank you. Hello. I love how you're wearing your triple camp Atlanta shirt. What do you mean? Of course. You're not promoting what you did. Ah, the April. No union gal. I, yeah. You can follow me on githumbanddribble.org. I think it should be those. I did. You were. You were at the. You were at the. Got some. Yeah. I was trying to figure out who you were. I don't actually link up my bendy girl with my union gal because I. More carry. I am such a leftist. I. For the longest time. Not. The reason. Yeah. I'm like. I'm kind of. That's for. The reasons for. More. Like. We lost. Quotes. And. To affect. So much. I know. Life. And then I was in class. I just got it from. And I know. For. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Congratulations. Thank you. And I was in a class. Where we were doing. And it's just. Two. Professor. Twice a week. And. I'm like. Ah. I'm. Making. See. I know it is created a whole. Another Twitter. And. I actually thought. It sounds good. I'm just going to. Take. The woods. So. From. Thank you. For. Best. Thank you so much. This is wonderful. I'm so glad that. You were here. I got to meet you. Exactly. It's nice to connect those. Twitter handles to actual. Human beings. Of course. I love. Ryan. I just adore him. And so. I love to connect about. What's it called? Triple Gulf punch. You already have the things. You were there on Monday. Was Brian there on Monday too? Brian was not there on Monday. But. I. Grab. Grab things. You already have the things. You already have the things. You already have the things. You already have the things. You already have the things. You already have the things. Grab things. Oh, good. You already have the things. You already have the things. Thank you very much. It was so nice to meet you. It was so nice to meet you too. Perfect. I'll see you around. Bye. Bye. Oh, so. So the three of you don't have to enforce your code to conduct, huh? Is that what you're saying? No. No, we had to eat. That's true. It's very, very true. We're thinking into a session. Because you're just the, was yours the code of conduct? Yeah. What? It's about events. Oh, okay. Because I was going to go to the, I had to code of conduct, but now what? Yes. Because people are basically not murderers, right? Is that what you're saying? Pretty much. Yeah, it's usually, it's fine until something happens. Yeah. So my theory is fix that before it happens, because you don't want to be spinning your wheels. Because that sucks when that happens. I got someone in here who wanted to talk about the Drupal drum last year. And I was like, no. I also have an interesting theory about that. I also don't like coming up with policies for the sake of policies. Like I'm in higher ed, so I'm, I'm, I'm dead by policy. Oh, all right. Well, government, hello. Really? Yeah, I'm, I'm just, I'm just. I can beat you there. Perfect. Okay, I'm going to participate for as long as I can. Play by example. One seat for one chair. Way up in front of me.