Abstract
Business schools actively promote student societies as platforms for engagement, leadership development, and employability enhancement. While existing research links participation in extra-curricular activities to improved graduate outcomes, student societies are typically framed as spaces of skill acquisition and career signalling. Much less attention has been given to their role as spaces of identity formation. Drawing on Social Identity Theory, this research shifts the conversation from employability outcomes to identity formation, contributing to scholarship on professional identity. It argues that business-related student societies may function as pre-professional microcosms in which students construct, negotiate, and rehearse emerging professional identities prior to entering the labour market. This developmental paper will adopt a qualitative, exploratory approach, using semi-structured interviews with students involved in business societies within an Australian business school.