People are strange...

So what are you to do if someone is hovering around your desk, unwanted, unwarranted, being personal or invasive?

What if, as best you can tell, they may be in some way un-/medicated and/or impaired from normal social interaction?

Well, people are strange and faces do look ugly when you are alone...

So here are some best practices for what to do if you find yourself alone at the desk with someone who is not there for business and seems invested in persisting in your space instead of passing through:

1)  Triage the threat, if the person appears in anyway violent, threatens violence and/or is verbally abusive, you should immediately call security, UCPD and/or use the panic button as the severity of the circumstances warrant.

2)  If the person does not appear harmful in the immediate, but is displaying unorthodox behaviors (e.g. sitting down in front of desk w/o a chair, singing loudly, talking to themselves, pacing, etc.) please radio for security.  Either explicitly, as a deterrent, "I need security at XYZ infodesk, someone is doing [X behavior]."  Or tactically, "Security this is XYZ infodesk please send someone over for a bathroom break" which will still bring Security to your desk, but will not alert the questionable behavior individual.  If you are feeling unsafe or uncomfortable, you may consider allowing the Security person to sit in the box with you for a while until the person leaves of their own accord or is escorted out by Police at the Security rover's discretion.  Either way, write an incident report describing the scene.

We seem to be having a couple recurring Infodesk lurkers that we will need to properly document to have them deterred from persisting, the only way to do this is via incident reports with good descriptions and details.  Doing this well and regularly, give Security more cause to properly address and remove those who can not properly comport themselves in the Library.

3)  Regarding sexual or implied references to affection or untoward advances (e.g. Persistent attempts to "hang out", explicit comments about your appearance or attire, etc.) In a sense, these also fall in the above category, but are worth discussing separately.  Any unwanted advance should be met with a firm "no", and if subsequent unwanted advances persist should be followed with calls to security, coworkers, UCPD, and responded to with, "Your continued advances make me feel uncomfortable."  After you have done this, if no one has yet arrived, you should simply ignore the person and help others.  Again, if you feel physically threatened or unsafe IN ANY WAY, feel free to walk/run away (with the radio) and advise someone where you have gone in the meantime.

So in summary, please utilize security rovers for any unorthodox behaviors, and document your circumstances via an incident report.  Ignoring the problem will not solve it, and may embolden those who seek to deter normal operations at our desks, please take the appropriate request and report actions to mitigate recurrences of problem patrons.



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