Joan Oefner - Rhema Association Management

Joan founded her association management company in San Francisco in 1993 to support international scientific and medical societies, growing the company to 4 full-time employees by 2005 before moving to a virtual office in Germany and specializing in management of European Workshops & Symposia. Became the Managing Director of the International Cytokine & Interferon Society (ICIS) in 2017 and the International Society for Developmental Psychobiology (ISDP) in 2018, as well as managing a few related scientific meetings (Tularemia International Society, EBV Association and KSHV Workshop), with meetings planned in Boston, San Francisco, San Diego, New York, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Austin, Hawaii, Chicago well many meetings in European citeis like Vienna, Cologne, Athens, Paris, Nice, Grenoble, Dublin snf Cardiff as well as Virtual & Hybrid Meetings.

Joan Oefner was honored with the 2020 ICIS Distinguished Service Award in recognition for her extraordinary contributions and service to the ICIS and to the cytokine research community at large. Now after eight years managing the International Cytokine & Interferon Society, it is time to pass the torch to Stephanie Flores, CAE, who also took over another former client (casss.org) as we focus on scientific associations and meetings with under 500 participants. At Cytokines 2024 in Seoul, Joan was honored with a named ICIS Student/Postdoc Member Travel Award.

In-Person Travel Award Winners ISDP 2021 Hybrid Meeting (220 attendees in Chicago, 287 on the Virtual Platform). Total registration of 507 participants was an all time record! Membership, especially Early-Career and Student, increased substantially as well.

Future: Expansion of the Team –Hannah Oefner is a rising professional in the field of association management, bringing a strong foundation in business and marketing to Rhema Association Management LLC, a family-owned firm she has been preparing to join since 2020. She recently obtained a Masters of Entrepreneurship & Tourism at MCI | The Entrepreneurial School® in Innsbruck, Austria and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Business Management from FH Kufstein Tirol – University of Applied Sciences, completed in July 2023, which included a paid internship in association management at the Vienna Medical Academy GmbH. Her academic background and hands-on experience uniquely position her to contribute to the strategic growth and operational excellence of Rhema’s client partnerships.

Hannah specializes in Social Media, Marketing & Communications, AI Tools, Graphic Design, Online Membership, Online Abstracts and Registration. We’re both excited about what lies ahead, because in this field, two really are better than one. As the African proverb wisely says: “If you want to go fast…go alone. If you want to go far…go together”