Tips for improving group discussion Group discussions have some familiar failure modes. Here are some tips we've learned. Compensating for gender socialization We are socialized - trained - to treat people differently based on our perception of their gender, and to act differently based on our own gender identity. Often we are unaware of the effects of this socialization. Many of us are working hard to overcome these biases, but it is hard to reverse a lifetime of training all at once. We don't believe anyone at this event is consciously sexist, just that we can all unintentionally behave in ways that favor men over women and genderqueer people.