Yes, turns out it takes some effort to be aware of power imbalance and work against it. Those words have different social meanings when spoken to a woman than when spoken to a man.
There's lots of guidelines about what not to do. There's less guidance about what to do instead.
I think personally I'd consider it a success just to be aware that whatever you're doing now might not be working, or might not work on this particular person - and with this in mind, look for feedback/signals and adjust your behaviour to circumstances.