On 11/10/13 10:21 AM, Ted Lemon wrote: > So, I don't actually know what to do to encourage more women to come > to IETF other than addressing harassment, which I realize is not > enough. I notice that you haven't been active on the list. Do you > have suggestions that you could contribute? I opted to sit the discussion out because I don't see a way to move forward on improving policies while still respecting the IETF consensus process - there's just too much disagreement that there's a problem. I do think there's stuff that can be done at an individual level and I've been impressed with this year's nomcom. I'd *love* to see a little more risk-taking in the choice of working group chairs, and mentoring once we bring on someone who's inexperienced and possibly somewhat clueless. Have apprentice working group chairs, if it comes to that. Intellectual leadership comes from the set of people who write influential drafts and the set of people who write influential reviews, and perhaps there's some way we can figure out to work with people to improve their drafts and/or improve their reviews (I've been trying to do that a bit). I think there are a few things that can be done on an individual, voluntary basis that won't require getting buy-in from people who still regret women getting the vote. I don't know if the diversity group has opted not to work on gender issues because it's just too contentious, because regional issues are easier, because they're planning to work on it later, because of lack of interest, ... but it's pretty striking. Anyway, the greybeards photo *is* kind of funny (although it looks pretty much like any night at the lodge here in Two Rivers, AK), but there is this association between the word "greybeards" and the notion of senior, wiser people who provide elder leadership, so maybe it's kind of uncool to be dismissive of the rather obvious observation that there were no women in the picture. A "Yeah, we realize that but [ ... ]" would have done the trick. Melinda