In front of a neatly arranged bookshelf in her office in Barcelona, Cecilia Delgado-Molina, Executive Secretary of the International Sociological Association (ISA), recounts a memorable experience that took place on the other side of the world, within the first year of taking on her role.
“We ended up paying for rooms that were empty. Because people had traveled long distances for in-person interactions, they did not turn up to hybrid sessions conducted by speakers through an on-site screen.”
Cecilia is referencing a 2023 hybrid conference held in Australia, ISA’s experiment at going hybrid. “After that conference, we felt more urgently than ever that the ISA needed a profound change.”
The path ahead was daunting. ISA had been founded in 1949, and its methods seemed rooted just as firmly in the 20th century. However, in 2023, under the leadership of the President and Executive Committee, the ISA began envisioning a transformation that is digital, yes, but also cultural. There was a recognition that there needed to be a reframing in everyone’s thinking.
Cecilia is a Mexican sociologist whose career has long been intertwined with ISA’s global research networks. She heads the Association’s Secretariat, a dedicated team committed to supporting the ISA mission and activities. The Secretariat was tasked with implementing that vision of digital transformation, which involves: fostering a digitally connected community, improving member services, and supporting ISA’s global research networks. The ultimate aim is to develop an association with sustainable, user-focused digital strategies that reflect a commitment to inclusivity, accessibility, and global collaboration.
The Secretariat’s first move was decisive: ISA’s paper archives had to go! In 2024, the association suspended paper archiving, with all new materials now living in their custom-built online member portal. After three intense months of migration, this portal brought easier membership renewals, real-time payments, and digital resources directly into members’ hands.
It was a good start, but Cecilia knew the real test of ISA’s digital maturity lay in reimagining how the members collaborate, learn, and connect with the association.
When the ISC Digital Journeys project offered 11 ISC members to undergo targeted digital transformation coaching, Cecilia seized the opportunity. ISA’s pressing challenge was designing a fully online symposium for 2026. Cecilia was aware that previous experiments had not worked, like the hybrid conference mentioned earlier, which had felt like two worlds colliding poorly. For ISA, having the symposium fully online would allow for greater representation from global majority regions.
The concrete support Cecilia and her team sought from the cohort was in building confidence to move forward with exploring suitable technical partners for this fully online symposium. They needed help crafting a Request for Proposal (RfP).
Over three sessions with a dedicated coach, ISA’s ambitions were conceptualized into an RfP that holds promise for a more connected and engaged digital gathering. ISA’s coach helped the team translate complex technical needs into clear requirements. By June 2025, the RfP had been published, drawing proposals from technology partners across the globe.
Looking forward, the Secretariat sees the 2026 online symposium as ISA’s most significant step yet. The vision they have is compellingly inclusive: “We expect more diversity, especially from regions usually underrepresented. This will open participation to scholars who cannot afford to travel due to climate, cost, or health issues.”
Group photo featuring ISA President Geoffrey Pleyers, ISA Executive Secretary Cecilia Delgado-Molina, ISA Secretariat staff, and local volunteers at the 5th ISA Forum of Sociology in Rabat, Morocco (2025). Credit: © International Sociological Association.
It was while working on the RfP that something unexpected also came up. “At first, we thought we were simply figuring out which platform to choose,” Cecilia says. “But what emerged was far bigger, a clear, structured toolkit that could help a similar organization facing the same digital uncertainty.”
Planning your online conference
This blog introduces a step-by-step guide designed to help science organizations plan and deliver effective online conferences. It offers a practical way to think through every stage of running a digital or hybrid event – from defining your purpose, to engaging participants, to capturing the legacy afterwards.
The resulting toolkit offers a straightforward roadmap to hosting inclusive online events. First, it demands clarity: Why hold the conference? What does success genuinely look like? Next, it turns attention to the participants that would be involved: Who are they, really? This is especially true for diverse global audiences, as their locations, languages, and barriers need to shape what is built.
Then comes the practicalities. Selecting the right platform, designing session formats that match member needs, and thoughtfully crafting spaces for genuine interaction. Cecilia acknowledges, with characteristic openness: “We are sociologists, but even we needed reminding that real interaction does not just happen. You have to deliberately create the conditions for it.”
A crucial, often overlooked step is the toolkit’s final pillar, measurement and legacy. What worked and what did not? How will we learn and improve for next time?
The result is a structured approach to conference planning, built from ISA’s reality, that other science bodies worldwide can easily adapt.
But perhaps the most profound lesson Cecilia took from the journey was the idea that change is continually practised. She is encouraging her team to see each decision as a little experiment, guided by questions like: Is this working for our members? If not, how can we adjust? The team has carried this mindset and approach into a website remodelling project, for which they are currently selecting a vendor. Shifting the lens to see members as the primary users of the tools, she hopes, becomes a guiding principle that is integrated into decision-making.
The Secretariat’s journey has moved from hoping for empty conference rooms to be filled, to actively centering the real human needs of the ISA’s members, and the communities they serve. As ISA continues to grow its digital ecosystem, it carries with it a renewed sense of purpose and a promise: no sociologist left behind.
Image: The Hybrid ISA World Congress of Sociology, Melbourne, Australia, 2023. Credit: © International Sociological Association.
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