Developing an Employee Code of Conduct for an Academic Medical Library

Background: This presentation describes the work of faculty and staff at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas' School of Medicine Library to collaboratively develop an employee code of conduct (Code). A meeting of the library faculty in 2019 discussed microaggressions and a lack of civil and inclusive discourse, particularly during promotion review; which led to historically excluded and junior faculty expressing feelings of being unsafe and disrespected. This discussion led to the suggestion and adoption of a project to create an employee Code at the medical library to foster respectful, inclusive communication, and serve as a model for the University Libraries.

Description: The University Libraries’ Conduct Policy focuses on patron behavior, but there is not a similar policy for employees. To address this, the medical library team decided to craft a code of conduct during team meetings throughout 2020. To start, the team collected examples of community agreements and codes of conduct from public, private, and academic institutions to use as inspiration. We then used an iterative, collaborative approach to determine final policy and wording. The final Code was launched in March 2021 and links to the document are included in team meeting agendas. We are now beginning an evaluation and improvement process for the Code to ensure it is meeting the original goal of the project.

Conclusion: This project was a necessary and successful bottom-up initiative for several reasons. As a highly diverse team of employees, this project allowed us to articulate and create a framework of shared values to put into practice. We used a collaborative, iterative and shared-leadership approach that allowed for broad ownership and buy-in within the team. The Code allows employees to operationalize expectations and actions with shared language. We hope that our work serves as an example of how employees can take positive, concrete action to create a more inclusive and accountable work environment.