Code of Conduct

Imperial Patient Experience Research Centre Public Involvement and Engagement Code of Conduct

Introduction

The Imperial Patient Experience Research Centre (PERC) is committed to making public involvement and engagement activities respectful and effective for everyone. Activities include events (e.g. meetings, workshops, training sessions) as well as communication (both online and in-person). This is regardless of gender, sex, sexual orientation, disability, age, physical appearance, body size, ethnicity, nationality or religion. We will not tolerate unprofessional and/or inappropriate behaviour including rudeness towards, or harassment of, staff or attendees in any form. As part of the registration process for public involvement and engagement activities and events, attendees are required to agree to follow this Code of Conduct.

For any event or activity hosted by Imperial College London, Imperial staff have the right to remove any person who does not adhere to this Code of Conduct.

The following Imperial College policies cover public involvement and engagement activities and their attendees:

• Harassment and bullying policy
• Safeguarding policy

Code of Conduct

This Code of Conduct is a guideline to ensure that a respectful and effective environment is maintained by all those attending our activities and events (and communicating with us) for the benefit of all. For this purpose, unprofessional and/or inappropriate behaviour shall include (but is not limited to) any activities that are judged by our staff to be:

• Personal: including private information about yourself (deemed inappropriate) or other people
• Offensive: imagery or comments that might reasonably be expected to cause distress to others. Such imagery or comments could relate to gender, race, nationality, sexual orientation, religion, disability or other similarly sensitive issues. Attendees are expected to act in a civil, tasteful and polite manner and agree not to use vulgar language.
• Harassing or bullying conduct: harassment is unwanted conduct (including insults and 'jokes') affecting the dignity of another, including written attacks on another person or aggressive pressure or intimidation. It also includes:
  • inappropriate physical contact
  • sexual attention or innuendo
  • deliberate intimidation
  • stalking
  • photography or recording of an individual without consent.
  • offensive or belittling comments related to gender, sexual orientation, disability, age, physical appearance, body size, ethnicity or religion.
  • comments which are mean-spirited
• Disrespectful: attendees are expected to show respect for participants of all ages and abilities.
• Disruptive: sustained disruption of talks, activities or other events
• Obscene: imagery or comments that are offensive, indecent or pornographic, including anything of a sexual nature
• Using multiple or inappropriate attendee profiles: If profiles are deemed to be inappropriate or multiple profiles are used for the purpose of disruption or annoying other attendees you may be barred from future activity. Using vulgar or offensive profile names will not be tolerated
• Repetitive or trivial comments: for example, spamming or raising off-topic material repeatedly
• Impersonation: posts perceived as impersonating another person
• Argumentative: one-to-one arguments with another attendee
• Misrepresentation/dishonesty: for example, providing demographic details or disclosing lived experience of a health condition which are necessary to be eligible for a public involvement opportunity and which are not correct including evading opportunities or questions to clarify that this information is correct
• Unprofessional: behaviour and communication should be appropriate for a professional audience including people of many different backgrounds.
• Confidential: providing any information or disclosure which would constitute a breach of the common law duty of confidentiality.
• Defamatory: communication which adversely affects the reputation of a clearly identifiable person, company or organisation
• An incitement: any material or comments that seek to influence another to undertake the commission of a criminal offence
• In contempt of court: disclosing information about live court proceedings before that information has been heard in court or where reporting restrictions are in place
• Party political: any comments that are clearly party political in nature. This is particularly relevant during elections, and comments that canvass support for, or opposition to, any political party
• In breach of copyright: comments that may infringe any of the laws governing copyright. PERC accepts no liability whatsoever for any actionable breach of such laws

Incident reporting and resolution

If you observe or experience someone not adhering to this Code of Conduct or in any way making you or anyone else feel uncomfortable, unsafe or unwelcome, and you are hesitant about addressing the person yourself, please report it as soon as possible to:

• One of the organisers of the event/activity (for online events, this may be via a direct message in the Chat box or an email or if in person, by speaking to an organiser); and/or 
• PERC’s public involvement team at publicinvolvement@imperial.ac.uk. 

PERC is committed to addressing and resolving any matters that arise with the individual involved by taking action that we consider to be appropriate to the best of our abilities (see below for examples of actions).

Sanctions

When someone is asked to stop any behaviour that contravenes this Code of Conduct, they are expected to comply immediately. If the behaviour does not stop, PERC staff may take any action they deem appropriate (including but not limited to):

• asking the person to cease the inappropriate behaviour, and warning them that any further reports will result in other sanctions
• requiring that the person avoid any interaction with, and physical proximity to, another person for the remainder of the event
• early termination of an event that violates this Code of Conduct
• not sharing the video or slides of an event that violates this Code of Conduct
• not allowing a speaker who violated the Code of Conduct to give (further) presentations at the event or a future event
• immediately ending any event/activity/correspondence (including a phone call)
• immediately withdrawing any role, responsibilities or privileges held
• requiring that the person concerned immediately leave the event/activity and not return
• removing the person concerned from an online event
• blocking the person concerned on social media platforms and email
• banning the person concerned from future events/activities
• publishing an anonymous account of the harassment
• reporting the incident to the employer of person concerned
• removal from a mailing list (temporarily or permanently)

Thank you for your participation in our activities and your efforts to keep our events/activities and communications professional, welcoming, respectful and friendly for all attendees and our staff.

Version date - August 2026