How do I make my finance club fun?

Love this topic since I switched majors to business after seeing how much fun and opportunities my friends were having in the business clubs.  I figure you’re a club officer, so I’ll give you some of my experiences.

• Video scavenger hunt with randomized small groups (ie went to the largest mall food court and ordered pasta with red sauce and white sauce - I guess thought that was funny at the time).  If you can’t get the off-site retreat early in the semester, do this.  Watch everyone’s videos together at the end of the event and provide food.  Great for bonding and getting folks outside their comfort zone a bit.  I started this and it was a hit.
• Off-site, over night weekend retreat (early in school year is best to form bonds; have some fun skits, team competitions).  Go big.  Like get a nice place/house. That will set the tone and set expectations for fun.  Enjoy partying with your friends. Lots of fond memories (and hangovers).
• To be honest, very helpful to have some good looking girls in the club (helps with the young alumni/professional participation at events more so).  Helps with recruiting other members.  A lot of times it’s luck of the draw but you can recruit.
• If your school doesn’t have an inter-club sports day, suggest it.  Tug of war, relay races, flag football, trivia.  Team games that out of shape business students can do decently well (or if you are in good shape, you dominate which is fun).  If too big of an ask at your school, challenge one or two other clubs. Rivalry! Us vs them is a great way to rally the team spirit, and fun.  At my school Beta Alpha Psi vs Accounting Club in flag football every year.  Competition was intense. Even had a trophy with the winning team and year on it.
• How well you help place and prepare members into/for internships and jobs, will attract members.  It’s really fun getting scholarships and job opportunities.  
• Participate in competitions against other schools.  Bring home the glory.  Beat higher ranked schools.  Get respect.
• Try to create a culture of openness as opposed to cliquey-ness.  I think actions / attitudes by the club officers is important.  I’d say, this will be one of the most important things you do as a college club officer.
• Set high standards for participation and get people to stick to it, and charge dues.  Main thing is to get members to buy-in and dedicate.  
• Have some exclusively (ie GPA) or build in this culture of success.  
   
• Important to keep in touch with alumni.  As an alum I participated in a virtual zoom trivia night and that was good fun (in many ways zoom allowed me to participate from another state, which was a first.  Continue this).  The trivia was mainly geography based like guessing flags of countries, tallest mountains, etc.  great topics.  
   
• helps to have a cool faculty advisor (if your club requires one).  Make sure you keep things in control.  Work hard, play hard.
• Back in the day, I’d see a lot of club members at certain nightclubs, so a mix of professional student and your social life / friends, that really helped grow the friends network.  It was magical.  (Later a bunch of us moved to the SF Bay Area for careers and kept the party going, and more joined us over the years, but many of us first met in the business clubs).

The University of Hawaii’s business clubs back in the day for me (and maybe still now) I thought was fun and beneficial.  If you need ideas, check out websites for BEST, Beta Alpha Psi, Accounting Club, and “Super Clubs Day” (for the sports competition), for ideas.  The best clubs have consistency in quality year after year. The professional community takes notice.

Other Observations

I found the Finance Clubs in general, one thing is they sort of lacked some concentration if there isn’t really a investment banking, management consulting, asset management, or Fortune 500 recruiting pipeline/focus (or a student led investment fund - that takes money).  The financial advisor/CFP and insurance tracks concentration, if that’s a heavy concentration of finance career opportunity at your school, I feel gets more suited for a more mixed major club (general business, including marketing folks).    If that’s what you have at your school, then check out Hawaii’s BEST Club (the North Shore beach house was / is legendary).  They do mixed business major club well.
 

The accounting focused clubs like Beta Alpha Psi had more of a focused base because the Big Four and regional/local firms hire a bunch of your members and there is more structure.  You might see folks who are aiming for IB and consulting in BAP, like I saw with the undergrads at the MBA I attended.

So depends on your school.  If your finance club is less focused on particular employers and more mixed interest students, then concentrate more on general professional development (resume workshops, mock interviews) and the bonding events (video scavenger hunt, retreat).  If everyone is focused on a narrower list of employers (Big Four, etc) then the more nerdy pursuits (competitions, also we had an event where we invited the professionals and the student groups presented on topics relevant to industry, as well as the general prof dev stuff like mock interviews).  

I’m many years post-graduation but had very fond memories and I made the most of the opportunities.

Anyways, set a great culture (make everyone feel included, less cliques) and unity and good relationships/experiences will happen.