Getting socialized but trying not to get stuck: early career professionals’ liminality in dual socialization processes

Abstract

Early career professionals actively seek career advancement opportunities while undergoing socialization within their organizations. This study employs the concept of liminality to examine their experience of in-betweenness in dual socialization—simultaneous organizational socialization and vocational/organizational anticipatory socialization for the next career chapter. We conducted repeat interviews with 22 U.S. early career professionals (n = 65), employed full-time. This longitudinal study uncovers how participants construct liminality as either a planned or an emergent phase; factors contributing to their discursive tension in liminality over time; and how they communicatively manage the tension to move forward. We propose a refined model of socialization [Jablin, F. (2001). Organizational entry, assimilation, and exit. In F. Jablin & L. Putnam (Eds.), The new handbook of organizational communication (pp. 732–818). Sage], which integrates liminality as a phase in which individuals feel neither fully “in” nor “out” of their organization. This enhanced model theorizes dual socialization as dynamic and interconnected processes through permeable organizational boundaries, addressing the contemporary career landscape with an increasing number and types of employment options.

I’ve been wondering if I’m settling too much in this job, just because it’s a job I found; and also thinking about the future of what I want. I don’t want to get stuck or feel like I’m stuck. (Brianne)

Early career professionals¹ (also referred to as “young professionals”) are individuals who have 1 to 5 years of work experience in their field. The exact definition can vary depending on the industry and the organization, but the first 5 years after earning a degree—whether undergraduate or graduate—is a crucial timeframe to one’s overall professional development (Calnan, 2019). During this time, individuals shed their past identity as students, explore their life as working adults, and look out for career advancement opportunities. Such a transitional period often triggers self-reflection, leading to “the absence of a self-defining connection to a given domain” (Ashforth, 2001, p. 136). The early career phase has become more complex today, as workers aged 25–34 years have a median tenure of 2.8 years, significantly shorter than workers aged 55–64 years (9.8 years) (U.S. Department of Labor, 2022). This means one or more job switches during this phase, making the already liminal early career experience even more ambiguous as they navigate multiple transitions before moving to mid-career.

In this study, we employ the concept of liminality to examine early career professionals’ experience of working in an organization while actively exploring their future career and organizational aspirations. Coined by Van Gennep (1960) to study cultural transitions from one social status to another (e.g., adolescents becoming adults), liminality refers to the middle state of a transition where an individual has left their former state of being and is in the process of going into a new state of being (Turner, 1977). Whereas early studies of liminality emphasized the disorientation felt by individuals moving through relatively rigid “rites of passage,” organizational scholars have increasingly applied this concept to contemporary work contexts where “boundaries are not always clear cut but can be graduated and dynamic” (Sturdy et al., 2009, p. 636) and individuals thus feel neither fully “here” nor “there” within employing organizations (e.g., Borg & Söderlund, 2015; Dailey et al., 2016).

We theorize early career professionals’ liminality as associated with undergoing dual socialization—one focusing on developing meanings of their participation in the current organization and the other on vocational/organizational anticipatory socialization (OAS) for their next career chapter. Theoretically, the liminal framing contributes to invigorating organizational socialization research, which has relied on a “relatively small number of theoretical frameworks” (Kramer, 2011, p. 235). Moreover, the proposed framework extends the literature beyond theorizing transitional experiences within organizations (e.g., going from newcomers to established members) to understand how members communicatively navigate and exist at the boundaries of the organization during socialization. Practically, this study addresses today’s dynamic career landscape. As flexible jobs, gig economy, and employment options continue to rise (Ashford et al., 2018), employees frequently contemplate job switches and seek personalized career paths (Dua et al., 2022; Kochhar et al., 2022). Understanding contemporary workers’ organizational socialization experience as liminal helps reframe career in-betweenness as a norm rather than an exception, regardless of their standard work positions.²

Organizational socialization and liminality

Organizational socialization refers to the “process by which an individual acquires the social knowledge and skills necessary to assume an organizational role” (Van Maanen & Schein, 1979, p. 211). In communication studies, Jablin (2001) theorized this process as assimilation, sparking a heated debate. The debate emerged, in part, due to concerns regarding the connotative confusion caused by the term “assimilation” to depict the one-way process of cultural absorption of a minority group by a dominant group (see Bullis, 1999). Thus, scholars have preferred socialization to refer to the interactive processes by which the focal organization and its members mutually influence what it means to be members. Organizational socialization continues to be a key area in communication, given its essential role in individuals’ adaptation to the functional and social aspects of the organization.

Jablin’s (2001) phase model, foundational for early socialization research, depicts four stages by which individuals transform from nonmembers to established members. In the first phase, anticipatory socialization, individuals learn and develop expectations about interested occupations (vocational anticipatory socialization or “VAS”) as well as organizations they wish to join (“OAS”). In the second stage, encounter, individuals enter and learn the ropes of the organization. Third, metamorphosis captures settling into one’s role as a fully accepted member. Finally, the exit stage involves disengaging with and departing the organization.

The stage model has been criticized for its unclear demarcation between phases as well as oversimplification of complex socialization processes (Myers & Oetzel, 2003). Nevertheless, it has guided valuable empirical examinations into specific facets of the socialization process. Arguably, the most fruitful line of socialization research has focused on the encounter phase, examining how newcomers manage uncertainties to facilitate their adjustment (e.g., Barge & Schlueter, 2004; Miller & Jablin, 1991; Woo et al., 2023). In the last decade, VAS has also received much attention due to the challenges of navigating a competitive job market and the need to address pipeline problems in certain fields (e.g., Dailey, 2016; Gan, 2021; Jahn & Myers, 2014). By attending to the sources, content, and framing of socialization messages, communication scholars have advanced theorizing the pivotal role of interaction in shaping both the processes and outcomes of socialization.

Despite the steady growth in socialization research, we identify two key limitations of the literature that drive our study. First, it has long been assumed that individuals’ goal in socialization is full organizational integration. Past studies relied on the premise that newcomers are motivated to adapt to their work environment (Miller & Jablin, 1991), to move through hierarchical ranks and become central figures (Van Maanen & Schein, 1979), and to achieve high levels of satisfaction and commitment as a result (Peltokorpi et al., 2022). Although scholars have acknowledged that socialization efforts may be resisted or modified by newcomers, such agentic behaviors are assumed to be aimed at adapting organizational roles to foster attachment and identification (Scott & Myers, 2010).

Gossett (2002) challenged a related assumption that organizations want fully integrated and committed members. In her study of temporary workers, Gossett showed that employers were not always interested or willing to foster member attachment to make the termination process easier. Building on this, we contend that those in today’s organizations, especially early career professionals, may not desire high levels of integration. Given their transitional period, early career professionals assess their organizational membership not only for the present but also in fulfilling career aspirations. Research on internships (Dailey, 2016; Woo et al., 2017) showed that interns’ forecasting into the future based on the present experiences led them to realize unmet expectations, which reduced their participation in organizational activities to protect themselves from over-investing. Although early career professionals are in a different career stage than interns, these studies suggest that workers may intentionally create distance from the organization based on their own meaning making. Indeed, early career professionals rarely view their current job as their ultimate career destination (Glickman, 2011), suggesting important implications for their socialization that warrant empirical investigation.

A second limitation motivating our study is that, despite the consensus that the transition from encounter to metamorphosis is not universal (e.g., Gailliard et al., 2010; Gist, 2016), empirical evidence is lacking to understand how some standard workers might exist between the two stages (see Allen, 1996, for an exception). A related limitation is the predominant focus on the transitional experiences of going from outsiders to insiders within organizations. Acknowledging this, Kramer (2011) stressed the need to consider how individuals navigate permeable organizational boundaries to further socialization research. Subsequent socialization models by scholars like Tornes and Kramer (2022) and Woo and Myers (2020) considered the implications of crossing fuzzy internal–external organizational boundaries, but they did not explicitly theorize about liminality constructed by those who do not intend deep integration into the organization. Focusing on (self-imposed) liminality allows for the examination of how these individuals’ communicative experiences may differ from those typically expected during organizational socialization, such as role negotiations and involvement (Gailliard et al., 2010).

Early career professionals’ liminality and tension in dual socialization

We posit that early career professionals navigate liminality in two dimensions that are connected through permeable boundaries. The first is within the employing organization. As members of the latest cohort of employees, they are transitioning to become veteran workers by crossing multiple boundaries of the organization (Van Maanen & Schein, 1979). Second, they are also in liminality in terms of their broader career stage, contending with issues such as underemployment and poor job fit (Smith et al., 2023). They likely treat their jobs as liminal, regardless of their employment condition, and continue to explore future employment possibilities. Thus, we frame their liminal position stemming from dual socialization—that is, simultaneously undergoing organizational socialization and vocational/OAS (V/OAS) to prepare for the next career chapter.

Early career professionals’ liminality in dual socialization is rooted in the misalignment between their objective and subjective states (Ballard & Gossett, 2007). Objectively, they are “in” the current organization as standard employees, whose liminality is expected to end as they become fully immersed members. Yet, their subjective experience of living in between career chapters (i.e., early and mid-career) may continue to make them view their own organizational position as “liminal” until they reach what they consider the ideal career stage. Ibarra and Obodaru (2016) recognized that subjective and objective liminal states do not always coincide, which can involve intense feelings “long before any concrete possibility for change begins to materialize, if at all” (p. 51).

The intense feelings felt by early career professionals in dual socialization can be seen as tensions (i.e., feelings of discomfort or tightness when facing oppositional choices; Fairhurst & Putnam, 2024). Tensions are often described through dialectics, where opposing “poles” push and pull against each other (Putnam et al., 2016). On the one hand (or pole), early career professionals are in the ongoing process of acculturation, being pulled into their organization through socialization efforts. On the other hand (or the opposite pole), they explore alternatives to ensure upward mobility, pushing themselves toward new potential jobs and/or organizations. As they navigate between these poles, tensions can emerge from communicative events involving both internal and external factors, making them feel stuck in liminality (Long et al., 2022). To be clear, this is not just about making a one-time decision to stay in or leave their organization; rather, similar to those struggling with work-life issues, tensions arise from ‘the stress involved in trading off the amount of time, energy, and effort that goes into one domain as opposed to the other’ (Putnam et al., 2016, p. 9) when both options seem valuable.

Indeed, “living in between career chapters can feel maddening” (Carucci et al., 2022, para. 18), compelling early career professionals to respond to tensions and move forward from their liminality. As past studies demonstrated, tensions can be useful or harmful depending on how they are communicatively managed (e.g., Tracy, 2004). For instance, Long et al. (2022) found that graduate student parents pivoted productively by leaning on friends and trusted mentors as a way of “turning into an alternative space” where their seemingly inconsistent identities are not “pitted against each other but celebrated as a whole” (p. 243). They related this to a “more-than” strategy of transcending the tension poles and embracing their dynamic interplay (Putnam et al., 2016), which requires a high level of reflexivity and behavioral dexterity (Fairhurst & Putnam, 2024). Early career professionals, who have limited work experiences, may instead respond to tensions through “either-or” (i.e., treating tension poles as incompatible and prioritizing one over the other) or “both-and” approaches (i.e., balancing or oscillating), given their contextual constraints in liminality (Putnam et al., 2016).

Research questions

Given the lack of socialization research using liminality, we propose three exploratory research questions (RQs) to guide our qualitative study. RQ1 asks, how do early career professionals with standard organizational membership enact liminality in dual socialization? This question is important given the misalignment of their objective and subjective states we noted earlier. Even though their status as organizational members is officially recognized by their employment, where they stand in their career stage is dependent on their subjective construction of career trajectory. Thus, an empirical investigation is needed to examine how their dual socialization becomes salient and leads them to treat their current position as liminal despite their standard organizational membership.

Next, we ask, how does early career professionals’ dual socialization engender tension (RQ2) and how do they live with, or move forward from, their liminality by managing the tension? (RQ3). Although we conceptualized dual socialization as a potential source of tension based on existing theory, empirical investigation is needed to explicate the communicative contexts through which tensions manifest and are managed. We explore these RQs through a longitudinal study because liminality entails a “longitudinal experience of ambiguity and in-betweenness within a changeable [emphasis added] context” (Beech, 2011, p. 288). Also, considering that dialectical tensions play out “recursively and reflexively over time” (Fairhurst & Putnam, 2024, p. 19), a longitudinal examination of liminality and tension, together, allows for capturing the constant motion in early career professionals’ dynamic processes of dual socialization.

Method

Research design

We used repeat interviews for our longitudinal study. This method allows for gaining deep, multilayered insights into issues raised in earlier interviews (Vincent, 2013) and for examining how individuals interpret changes in their environment (Corden & Millar, 2007). Initially, we planned three interviews with the same individuals at one-month intervals; but due to scheduling challenges, actual intervals ranged between 1.5 and 3 months. Such variations are inherent in longitudinal qualitative studies, where timing of interviews is contingent upon an event sequence in the participants’ varied lives (Hermanowicz, 2013). This study design also enabled us to examine how early career professionals (re)interpret tensional experiences of liminality in light of their evolving environments—capturing both “close and distant moments of doing and accounting” (Fairhurst & Putnam, 2024, p. 46)—a perspective that might be lost after they transition to the next career chapter.

Data collection

Data collection occurred between July 2019 and June 2022. This meant that, except for the first four participants who were interviewed in 2019, all other participants experienced the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic during or prior to participation in this study. Our purposive sampling adhered to the following inclusion criteria, specifically developed to identify early career professionals in liminal states as conceptualized in this study: (a) graduated within the past five years with either undergraduate or graduate degree; (b) employed full-time in permanent positions for at least 3 months, or no longer consider themselves as “new” (to exclude liminality experienced as newcomers); (c) feel uncertain about the current job but do not yet have a specific plan to leave the organization. The last criterion was important to recruit those who are in liminality but not already going through organizational exit processes. Eligible participants had to satisfy all three criteria at each interview.

To recruit participants, we (a) distributed flyers via social media sites and graduate program listservs at two large U.S. universities; (b) met with a Director of Career Services at one of the two universities, who connected the first author with recent graduates; and (c) used snowball sampling by asking participants to refer their colleague who meets the inclusion criteria. Through our iterative recruitment efforts, we conducted initial interviews with 29 early career professionals. Among them, seven were interviewed only once because they either did not meet one of the inclusion criteria (e.g., already had the next job lined up) or did not respond to follow-up interview requests and were therefore dropped from our data set. Among the remaining 22 participants, 1 person unexpectedly left her job after the second interview and thus became ineligible. We decided to keep this participant’s first two interviews in our data set because those were collected when she was still in liminality. As a result, our final data set included 65 interviews with 22 individuals (see Table 1 for their profile).

The two authors conducted the interviews by staying with the same participants at all three time points, which ensured continuity and rapport building (the first author interviewed 17 participants and the second author 5 participants). We used a semi-structured interview protocol for the first interview, including questions about their background; why they were feeling unsure about the current job and/or organization; how they are trying to mitigate the effects of liminality, if any; communicative relationships in and outside the workplace (e.g., with whom they discussed liminality); and their ideal next career chapter. In subsequent interviews, we individualized questions based on earlier interviews (Hermanowicz, 2013; e.g., “You mentioned last time that you were hoping to talk to your manager about promotion. How did that go?”). During interviews, we opted for more relatable language such as “in-betweenness” or “feeling stuck” rather than using conceptual terms such as liminality and tension.

All interviews were conducted virtually and audio-recorded via Zoom. The first interviews lasted 60 min on average. The second and third interviews were shorter (ranged between 35 and 45 min) because we were already familiar with their background and focused on following up on the issues discussed previously. All interviews were transcribed verbatim, which resulted in 995 pages of single-spaced documents. Interviewees received a $15 gift card after each interview.

Data analysis

The two authors moved through data analysis iteratively in four main stages.³ First, we immersed ourselves in the data by reading and summarizing the interview transcripts while we were collecting additional data. It was during this constant comparison (Charmaz, 2001) that the tension between dual socialization processes emerged as a sensitizing concept. Second, after completing data collection, we engaged in first-cycle coding (Tracy, 2013) by re-reading the interviews and assigning descriptive labels to emerging thought units, such as “setting a time limit for current job,” “appreciating the work experience,” and “(current job as) investment for future.” We jointly coded the first 15 interviews (23% of the data set) until we reached consensus on how to code and organize the codes according to the RQs. Then, the two authors divided the remaining interviews and coded them individually. For RQ2, our first-cycle coding process functioned simultaneously as within-case analysis (Ayres et al., 2003), where we treated each participant as a “case” and captured evolving contexts across three interviews that intensified their sense of in-betweenness and engendered tensions.

Next, we conducted second cycle coding (Tracy, 2013) by comparing and synthesizing the coded data. This also served as across-case analysis (Ayres et al., 2003) aimed at identifying similarities across participants in terms of how they enacted liminality (RQ1), experienced tension in liminality (RQ2) and managed the tension (RQ3). For RQ1, we grouped codes such as “setting a time limit for the current job,” “plan to apply for graduate school,” and “current employment as a means of financial support during career exploration” into a theme called liminality as a planned phase. For RQ2, we grouped codes such as “a new executive leader’s arrival,” “restructuring,” and “rumors about manager’s demotion,” into a theme called organizational change that contributed to their tension. For RQ3, codes such as “not talking about work during lunch hour” and “skipping happy hour to study for LSAT” were grouped in a theme called maintaining clear boundaries for VAS. The final stage involved refining and integrating themes into “a meaningful theoretical framework that specifies conditions and consequences” of liminality (Hermanowicz, 2013, p. 200) and finding representative examples.

Results

Our findings are organized into three sections, addressing each of our RQs. When using interviewee’s direct quotes or examples, we refer to them by their pseudonym (see Table 1) along with their interview sequence number (e.g., “Eddie 2” or “Kay 3”).

Early career professionals’ liminality in dual socialization (RQ1)

Despite all participants holding full-time positions (i.e., standard organizational membership; Ballard & Gossett, 2007), they were anticipating a transition to the next career chapter and hence found themselves in liminality. However, they constructed their liminality differently based on when they enacted VAS/OAS relative to their socialization in their current organization.

Planned dual socialization: liminality as an expected phase

For half of our participants, dual socialization was a process they planned when they were undergoing anticipatory socialization for the current organization. They applied for and took their current job expecting to actively engage in VAS for their next career chapter (e.g., “I went to this job knowing what I was going to do: work, study, and prepare for the future”; Mae 1). Three common reasons emerged for putting themselves in such a liminal state. First, they needed job experience to qualify for their desired roles (e.g., “A lot of the jobs I looked at say they require two or three years of experience”; Frank 1). Second, some were avoiding an employment gap as they prepared for graduate school (e.g., “I applied last fall [but] didn’t get in, so I thought, ‘okay, I need to work on my LSAT more and get some work experience”; Rita 1). Third, others treated the job as a means of financial support while continuing to search for, or work toward, their career goals (e.g., “I am willing to stick it out until I achieve my goal because I don’t want to lose the money”; Devyn 1).

Consequently, these early career professionals described their current employment as a deliberate “placeholder” or “steppingstone” in their career trajectory (e.g., “I never saw myself staying put in property—it was merely just a placeholder [while] I am still looking for roles in my desired field”; Lawrence 1). However, the planned nature of dual socialization did not necessarily prevent them from experiencing ambiguities inherent in liminality, such as deliberating on the viability of their initial plan and whether settling down in the current organization might be more ideal. For example, Hana (1), an entry-level analyst at a government research lab for 7 months, said:

My plan was to do this job for a year and apply to grad school […] but then, I’ve been thinking, well, I know what my end goal is [which is to work for a government lab as a scientist], and I am already here. [My mentor told me that] if I just stay here for a few years, they could just hire me in a more advanced role that doesn’t require a PhD.

By her third interview, Hana returned to her initial plan by saying, “I started studying for GRE. I don’t know if I’m staying in the job for more than a year anymore” (more examples of this push–pull tension in liminality are provided in our findings for RQ2). Those who planned their dual socialization, like Hana, used it to guide their decision making as they became further socialized into the organization (e.g., considering taking a promotion based on its impacts on their VAS and career planning).

Unintended dual socialization: liminality as an emergent phase

For the other half of our participants, liminality became salient after the encounter phase of organizational socialization. At that point, they initiated VAS—enacting dual socialization—for three main reasons. First, they identified aspects of the job they could not envision doing for the long term and explored alternatives (e.g., “[I learned that working in nonprofit involves] so much change, turnover, and high workload—but the thing is, I am not exactly sure what else I want to do”; Tina 1). Second, some discovered different roles within the organization that seemed better aligned with their career goal, but the organization did not support the role change (e.g., “I realized I want to transition to the social strategy department, but I’ve gotten the sense from my agency that it’s not a preferred pathway”; Eddie 1). Third, others felt social pressure for early career professionals to switch jobs every few years to advance their careers (e.g., “I keep hearing, unlike the previous generation, we tend to advance our salary and positions if we keep moving, so I feel like I should be doing that”; Kay 1).

For these participants, finding themselves in liminality was unexpected because they did not initially consider their jobs as liminal. Thus, despite their reports of “feeling lucky and grateful [to have this job]” (Brenda 1) and “enjoying what [they] do now” (Kay 3), they faced uncertainties regarding their future in the organization (Brenda 1) and if they should switch their career field entirely (Kay 3). This uncertainty differed from that typically experienced during organizational socialization, as it was not due to a lack of information about their roles, tasks, or workplace relationships (Kramer, 2010); rather, it resulted from having sufficient information to assess the current organization’s fit with their career goals. Their reaction to uncertainty also diverged from conventional research findings. Instead of, or in addition to, seeking information or negotiating changes within the organization to meet their needs (Jablin, 2001; Miller & Jablin, 1991), they distanced themselves from the organization to facilitate VAS/OAS, as will be demonstrated later.

Experience of tension in liminality over time (RQ2)

In addressing RQ2, our longitudinal data revealed how the liminality of early career professionals—caught between the push toward their next career stage (i.e., VAS and OAS) and the pull of remaining in the organization—engendered tension over time. We found the three most salient changes that contributed to their tension, visualized in Figure 1 and illustrated below.

Applying for jobs

Not surprisingly, participants’ sense of in-betweenness motivated them to explore and apply for different jobs, which became a source of tension. Although communicating with interviewers excited them about a potential transition, the outcomes of those conversations were often disappointing, leaving them feeling stuck in their liminal position. We use Frank’s case to illustrate this theme. Frank has worked as a coordinator in a university’s events office for 6 months, but his ultimate goal was to work in the hospitality industry. In his first interview he said, “I [pause]—honestly, I look every day for a new job.” He added that applying for jobs does not “get in the way of [his] work,” but it does empower him to distance himself from the organization: “There’s the whole drama with the director, and I don’t wanna play the whole political game.” At this point, Frank’s active efforts to move out of his liminality and advance to the next career stage through VAS and OAS were clear.

In his second interview, he reported having gone through seven job interviews since our first interview. However, the job offers “end up being, either the pay isn’t exactly where I need it to be, or the actual job itself isn’t what I thought it was going to be.” Of course, not getting the job offers was also highly disappointing. One hiring manager told him, “We’ve already filled our positions, but we have these part-time positions open.” Although the part-time job would help him make his transition to the hospitality industry, it did not seem realistically better than his current job. At the end of his second interview, Frank said, “Going through the interview process kind of made me appreciate the job I have.” He went as far as to say, “I think I am 100% into the position I have now, and I really want that manager position [that recently opened up].” Compared to the first interview, his second interview indicated his pull toward the organization and acceptance of a change of plans (see Figure 1A).

However, in his third interview (2.5 months later), Frank reported being back to applying for a job again: “It was right after our last meeting, I got an email from one of my professors, saying, ‘hey, we know the hotel manager who’s looking for a sales coordinator.’ I was like, ‘Oh, that’s exactly what I’m looking for!’” Frank found renewed hope for the transition to his next career chapter as he contacted the hiring manager. Like Frank, several other participants experienced the same cycle of push–pull dynamics when applying for jobs. Levi, who worked at a logistics firm, initially reported applying for jobs in the sports industry, then deciding to “stick it out” in his organization, only to engage in VAS again even more aggressively (e.g., seeking job shadowing opportunities in sports teams). Although these early career professionals thought that they would “not lose anything” by applying for jobs, the push–pull dynamics seemed to exacerbate the negative aspects of liminality. For example, Caroline (2), a university faculty member, described that not getting the job she applied for was “devastating…it was awful.” The experience of declining or not receiving job offers reminded them of their liminal position, not knowing if, when, and how they could transition out of it.

Organizational change

A second theme contributing to early career professionals’ tension was organizational change, such as restructuring, new management, and shifts in work pace. Even though these changes brought optimism about potential career growth, they also raised new questions about their future in the organization. For instance, Rebecca, a client services rep at an ad agency for 7 months, initially expressed positive sentiments about her organizational socialization, other than having general ambiguity about her career (e.g., “I love the company, which is why I am staying put where I am… [although] there’s a bit of like, ‘am I doing the right things?’”; Rebecca 1). After the second interview, her employer underwent reorganization that affected her role: “There’s been a lot of discussion about what the change means, what my next role will look like, what a promotion looks like” (Rebecca 3). Such communication clarified her understanding of organizational membership and its path forward. At the same time, the new possibilities made her feel like, “I don’t know if any of those [promotion pathways] are really what I am passionate about.” In her final reflections, she described experiencing push–pull dynamics as she pursued promotion opportunities within the organization while also planning to actively engage in VAS outside of the organization (see Figure 1B):

I have been so much busier [since the reorg], which is causing me to think, ‘Okay, is this really what I want to be doing for the next however long?’ […] Honestly, [the change] has motivated me to dive deeper into the new promotion pathways and ask myself, ‘Is that something I really want?” […] I’m going to start exploring outside of the company—just looking, talking to other professionals in the industry and seeing what their day to days are.

Brenda, a human resource specialist of 2.5 years at a university, had a similar experience of tension with a leadership change. In her second interview, she indicated her excitement about the new Vice President (VP), who seemed “a lot more empathetic and ethical than the former VP” and will likely “see everyone for their skills and give them their opportunity to shine.” But in her third interview, she reported on the VP’s lack of communication as follows: “When I email him to request information, he doesn’t answer at all […] That makes me feel like I don’t know how to manage my job and worried that I wouldn’t be able to move up, like, I am stuck here.” In this liminal state, she reminded herself that “I have options [to move to another job]” and put more efforts into her graduate education, even though she was not willing to give up her current role. Our longitudinal data helped us capture participants’ progression from initial hope about organizational change to ambiguities following its implementation, which engendered tension in their dual socialization. As they experience even longer-term implications of change, it is possible for them to be pulled back into organizational socialization (e.g., a promotion, raise, or job transfer that meets their career goals), thereby creating a cycle of push–pull dynamics.

Environmental disruption (the COVID-19 pandemic)

Lastly, we show how environmental disruptions, specifically the COVID-19 pandemic during our data collection period (2019–2022), engendered tension for early career professionals undergoing dual socialization. For those who planned for dual socialization and expected their liminality to end at a certain point, pandemic-related disruptions forced them to “stay put” in the organization indefinitely. For instance, Esther, a diversity recruiter at a tech nonprofit, said in her first two interviews how she was following a rigorous study schedule to take her GRE for the upcoming graduate school application cycle. But, in her third interview which occurred in April 2020, she said: “Oh, I was pretty irritated [about the GRE being canceled] but I can’t blame them. It wasn’t until today I started feeling like I didn’t lose as much, considering everything […] I can take it later” (Esther 3). The unexpected shift highlighted the tension in her liminal position as she continued to navigate socialization in her organization while simultaneously engaging in VAS (see Figure 1C). Esther’s statement, “I can’t blame them,” reflects her acceptance of the unavoidable and uncontrollable tension, even as she dealt with the stress and anxiety of existing in between dual socialization processes for an unknown duration.

Those who did not plan for dual socialization had similar experiences of tension. Sunny, a hardware engineer of 10 months at a reputable tech company, mentioned in her first interview that her role did not seem to be a good fit for her. In her second interview, conducted just before the outbreak of the COVID-19 disease in the United States (February 2020), Sunny said she started studying data science with the intention of switching her career path from hardware to software engineering (i.e., active VAS). Then, in her third interview (April 2020), she reported having “mixed feelings since the pandemic started” and elaborated further:

Ultimately, my desire to move forward from the current position has not changed. But seeing that so many people lost jobs and are in vulnerable situations, I started to appreciate the fact that I have a stable job at a well-known company that pays me regularly. And the pandemic made me also realize that my career change won’t happen according to my plan, so I thought, ‘I shouldn’t think about quitting this job until I have a definite next step set in stone.’

Sunny’s reflection indicated her acceptance of being pulled into the current role, while not letting go of her VAS effort to make her desired career transition a reality in the future. Although early career professionals are not the only group impacted by the pandemic, participants’ voluntary liminality seemed particularly inseparable from “everything that’s happening with the pandemic” as their already ambiguous state became indefinitely liminal, making them feel anxious about “when and what [their] path forward will be” (Alivia 3). In Sunny’s case, even though she embraced her reality, maintaining hope in the VAS pole of the tension and working as an appreciative, committed employee often led to an inherent tension, such as feeling uneasy about “getting too comfortable in the current position [because] then it’d get harder to move on [when the right opportunity comes up]” (Sunny 3).

Managing tension to move forward from liminality (RQ3)

Early career professionals’ experiences of tension illustrated above suggested their vacillation between organizational socialization and VAS/OAS. Vacillation, a “both-and” response to tension, focuses on “shifting back and forth between the poles at different times or in different contexts” (Putnam et al., 2016, p. 60). Their vacillation, however, was not always a strategic response to tension. Oftentimes, they did not have a choice but to shift toward the opposite pole even when they did not want to (e.g., not accepting/receiving a job offer). As Putnam et al. (2016) noted, vacillation involves “accentuating distinctions between the poles” (p. 60) and often disintegrates into separation—that is, an “either-or” response to tension that splits the tension poles and treats them as independent of each other. Indeed, in our analysis for RQ3, which focused on how participants intentionally responded to tension to move forward from liminality, we found their use of separation practices in two related ways.

First, they kept the tension poles separated in terms of communicating about them with others. In the workplace, they deliberately avoided discussing their liminality and focused solely on organizational socialization issues, reserving VAS/OAS for conversations with their external network. For instance, Mae, a data process engineer of 9 months at a hospital, was anxiously waiting to hear about her law school application outcomes. When asked if she told her coworkers or manager about her status, she said, “I don’t feel like I need to tell anyone; and I don’t think it’s fair to bring someone who’ll be affected by my decision into that kind of chaos until I figure it out myself…like, who is to say I would even get in anywhere?” (Mae 2). In addition to not wanting to cause chaos in the workplace, they also desired to keep the current organizational membership as a safety net while engaging in VAS/OAS. Brianne (1) said, for example, “I try avoiding talking about my future plans because I want to keep this door open in case this is the only job opportunity I have.”

Alivia (1) said that she only talks to her family or close friends “who aren’t going to try and sway me one way” as she tries to decide “what is going to make [her] happy.” When she spoke to her supervisor, she left out liminality and asked generally about what her “next steps look like” to assess her growth potential in the organization. Similarly, Sunny (2) used disguising conversations (Miller & Jablin, 1991) to learn information from coworkers about switching from hardware to software engineering: “[In my conversations] I indicated curiosity about the path without saying that’s my interest, because they might be talking amongst themselves and find out that I’m going around asking about it.” Only four participants openly discussed their liminality upon discovering a coworker in a similar situation. In these cases, their liminality became a shared secrete, which helped them bond over “being in the same place in life” (Eddie 1) and made “going to work more enjoyable” (Rita 2).

Another separation practice was evidenced by their effort to demarcate clear work-life boundaries to not “let the job be all-consuming” (Devyn 2) and to save resources for VAS/OAS outside of work. For example, Mae (1) discussed leaving work on time and skipping her team’s happy hours because she “needed to have those hours at the end of the day to study for the LSAT.” She added, “I definitely would’ve stayed late if it wasn’t for that.” Similarly, Annie (1) said: “If someone asks me to do something during lunch, I say, ‘I will deal with it later.’ I also asked people to not text me after work unless it’s dire emergency.” Although they consistently reported “not giving that extra effort” (Levi 1) to protect their life outside of work to study, network, or research other career opportunities, they emphasized giving their best while they are at work. For example, “[Making work-life boundaries clear] is not about me putting less effort into my work—I always try to produce the best thing I can” (Brenda 3). Trying to perform their best during work hours seemed at least partly motivated by their desire to have positive job references to facilitate their anticipated transition: “I definitely think about the fact that I don’t want anything less than a great recommendation from my boss” (Rita 3).

Discussion

We explored the liminality of early career professionals during dual socialization, which involves being simultaneously socialized into their organization and their future career stage. The two dimensions can co-occur harmoniously if the organization is where they envision the next career chapter. However, our study showed that early career professionals often knew during the encounter phase of socialization or even earlier that their expected career transition would occur at a different organization. This expectation may have been shaped by discourses such as “your first job doesn’t matter” (Glickman, 2011) and “you need to keep moving to advance career or salary” (as noted by Kay in our findings). Our longitudinal data revealed how push–pull dynamics of tension evolved over time in their dual socialization, leaving them feeling neither fully “in” nor “out” as organizational members. Additionally, we demonstrated how their vacillation between organizational socialization and VAS/OAS motivated the communicative separation of the two poles (e.g., demarcating work-life boundaries and talking about each pole with different audiences). These findings illuminate early career professionals’ discursive construction and management of liminality and offer important implications.

First, our study contributes to conceptualizing liminality as a fundamental aspect of early career professionals’ socialization experience. Normalizing liminality helps them make sense of their experience, especially if/when they feel their sense of in-betweenness is unique or exceptional (e.g., “I’m behind my friends, who are, like, executives” [Tina 3]). It also extends beyond the transitional experiences of moving from organizational outsider to insider status (or vice versa) in socialization research to include the communicative experiences of those who consider themselves neither fully outsiders nor insiders. Without using liminality as a key concept, previous research may have described our participants as dealing with uncertainties. Even though uncertainty is related to liminality (i.e., not knowing when and how one will transition), uncertainty alone does not capture the dynamic, multidimensional, and tensional experiences in early career professionals’ socialization processes.

Our explicit focus on liminality provided valuable insights into early career professionals’ dual socialization, but it is crucial to distinguish their voluntary liminality from involuntary liminality faced by marginalized organizational members. Our participants chose to engage in VAS/OAS while employed, placing themselves in liminality. This contrasts with Allen’s (1996) notion of involuntary “outsider within” status due to exclusionary organizational practices. Thus, in recognizing liminality as an expected aspect of early career socialization, we underscore this distinction (hence our use of the label “voluntary liminality” throughout this discussion) and encourage other researchers to be attentive as well. Additionally, we suggest future research explore how marginalized group status further complicates dual socialization in early careers, considering the organizational power structures that may intensify in-betweenness as highlighted in Allen’s (1996) work.

Second, we developed a theoretical model based on Jablin’s (2001) stage model, with the aim of adding complexity to the conceptualization of socialization processes and providing a clear framework for future investigations (see Figure 2). We made three main updates to Jablin’s model, the first of which is specifying the permeable boundary of the organization (depicted as a dotted line around organizational socialization stages in Figure 2) and incorporating the simultaneous VAS/OAS process outside of this boundary. As our findings indicated, early career professionals’ sense of in-betweenness is shaped by the interaction (or push–pull) between what happens in their organization and their anticipatory socialization outside of work (e.g., Frank realizing during a job interview he is “too much of a yes man” at work when answering a question about his weakness, and then pulling back on projects at work). Our revised model responds to the calls to conceptualize socialization as dynamic and multidimensional processes (e.g., Gailliard et al., 2010; Scott & Myers, 2010) and builds on previous efforts to theorize the implications of fuzzy organizational boundaries (e.g., Kramer, 2011; Woo & Myers, 2020). Moreover, our recognition of permeable organizational boundaries allows researchers to consider VAS and OAS as processes not only occurring prior to employment (e.g., Dailey, 2016; Gan, 2021; Jablin, 2001; Kramer, 2010) but also during employment.

It is worth noting here that we did not distinguish between VAS and OAS in our model (Figure 1) but included a phase labeled broadly as “anticipatory socialization” because individuals’ inquiries about their next career chapter often intertwined the two to varying extents based on their unique circumstances and goals. For instance, participants who were applying for jobs clearly engaged in OAS, but they were also learning about a particular organizational role and its conditions during job interviews, such as the duties and salary of a hotel manager (i.e., VAS). Others predominantly underwent VAS contemplating career transitions, while considering organizational factors (e.g., asking mentors what it is like to be an engineer in general versus at a particular organization). Although VAS and OAS have been described as interrelated (Jablin, 2001), how they reinforce or conflict with one another has been underexplored and undertheorized. The nuanced blend of VAS and OAS indicated in early career professionals’ dual socialization in this study warrants further investigation in future research.

A second update we made to Jablin’s (2001) stage model is adding “voluntary liminality” after encounter and before exit (see Figure 2). By theorizing this liminality as a distinct phase, our model deviates from the conventional liminality assumption prevalent in past socialization research (e.g., progressing from an outsider to an insider during the encounter phase or the reverse during the exit phase; Kramer, 2010). Our model explicitly acknowledges that the encounter stage does not lead to metamorphosis in a linear fashion; instead, organizational members may exist in this liminal space for an unknown period and may (or may not) reach metamorphosis at different times and in different contexts. As our study demonstrated, staying in this phase involves tensions (depicted as arrows going both ways from “voluntary liminality” in Figure 2) as individuals grapple with the allocation of resources to VAS/OAS and determining the extent to which they should integrate into the organization.

Our model suggests that individuals undergo an encounter stage before entering voluntary liminality, based on insights drawn from our data. Our participants, with an average tenure of 10.5 months, had moved past the encounter phase and shared retrospective reflections on their organizational entry. They described encounter as a distinct phase marked by excitement, surprises, and/or disappointments (Louis, 1980). Even those who planned for voluntary liminality reported prioritizing learning their roles during this phase due to its potential for future career benefits, minimizing their liminality’s salience and remaining open to possibilities that could alter their plans. They employed indirect information-seeking tactics to gather insights into potential growth opportunities in the organization, indicating active forecasting of a future career transition (Dailey, 2016). Thus, the encounter phase likely served as a “trial” period for early career professionals, leading to voluntary liminality as a consequence of the ambiguous outcomes from this evaluative phase.

An alternative explanation is that, for those who planned their career transition from the outset, voluntary liminality was an underlying dynamic throughout their socialization processes rather than a discrete phase. Although our participants retrospectively reported downplaying their sense of liminality to fully embrace the entry experience, it might have shaped their anticipatory and encounter phases in nuanced ways beyond what our data, collected months after their entry, could capture. Thus, exploring the communicative implications of these individuals’ “anticipatory liminality” in the early stages of organizational socialization and beyond presents a promising area for future research.

The third and final update we made to Jablin’s (2001) model depicts organizational exit initiated at the conclusion of anticipatory socialization for one’s desired career transition (see Figure 2) rather than metamorphosis. In discussions about their anticipated exit, our participants expressed reluctance to give up the current organizational membership until their VAS/OAS leads to concrete possibilities (e.g., a job offer or acceptance into graduate school), citing concerns about finance or employment gaps. This suggests that their exit will be contingent on transitioning out of liminality based on their VAS/OAS. Here, a conceptual question worth considering may be if/how early career professionals’ exit process overlaps with their anticipatory socialization into their next career chapter. Although our participants were not yet disengaging from work or actively preparing for their departure, they exhibited communicative and psychological distancing from their organization (e.g., avoiding certain social events; and not putting in extra efforts). Future research could explore the relationship between voluntary liminality and exit, addressing questions such as “How does early career professionals’ anticipation of exit facilitate and/or hinder their dual socialization?” and “Should scholars consider exit to have commented when anticipated exit impacts their communication and/or work?”

In addition to the proposed framework, this study contributes to theorizing tension in the context of liminality during dual socialization. Although both liminality and tension involve being in between two states that cannot be achieved simultaneously, they differ in conceptualization, with liminality referring to position or location (Söderlund & Borg, 2018), and tension pertaining to “feeling states” resulting from dealing with paradoxes (i.e., “stress, anxiety, discomfort, or tightness”; Putnam et al., 2016, p. 4). Our longitudinal study uniquely combined these concepts, revealing the dialectic nature of socialization processes and their communicative implications. Despite reported stress, participants’ vacillation between socialization poles facilitated their learning and deliberations on career possibilities within and outside the organization. This suggests that tensions can be generative of resources for career decision-making. In the same vein, individuals’ early career job experience itself can be considered VAS and OAS for their next career chapter, informing their fit with different occupations and organizations. Thus, tensions may not simply be an inescapable feature of dual socialization but also a factor enabling transition out of liminality, depending on how they are managed.

Individuals’ productive response to tension in this context may be linked to the concept of liminality competence (i.e., the capacity to navigate liminal states effectively and thrive in the workplace; Borg & Söderlund, 2015). In our study, early career professionals enacted this competence by separating tensional poles into independent opposites (i.e., “either-or” response; Fairhurst & Putnam, 2024), preserving the option to stay at their current organization if needed. They also reported that this approach facilitated exploring career possibilities (VAS/OAS) without negatively affecting their job performance as they dedicated their best effort in each respective space. However, scholars have cautioned that this separation strategy, albeit advantageous in the short term, may not be sustainable over time and could potentially exacerbate stress or conflicts (see Putnam et al., 2016). Considering that our longitudinal study spanned a relatively short period (three to 7 months of employment), longer-term effects of this tension management practice in voluntary liminality remain unclear. Future research could delve into the extended consequences of the “either-or” response to tension and delineate the relationship between tension management and liminality competence.

Our study offers practical implications for managers. They should be mindful of early career employees’ dual socialization and related complexities illustrated in our findings, helping them navigate both what it means to be part of the organization and a member of their profession. Managers can also foster open communication and trust by initiating regular check-ins to gage early career employees’ evolving interests and passions while understanding that they may not feel comfortable disclosing their liminal experiences. Proactive communication about career advancement opportunities and upcoming organizational changes can aid early career employees’ decision making and capacity to align their anticipated career transition with organizational objectives for mutual benefits.

Limitations and directions for future research

This study is not without limitations. First, as discussed in our method, we initially planned three repeat interviews at 1-month intervals for all participants, aiming for consistency. However, our research experience revealed that participants’ unique work and life events influenced their perceived adequacy of time, with some finding 1.5 months sufficient and others needing a few months to report changes in their liminal experiences. It is possible that some participants desired even more time to make sense of salient changes but felt pressured to respond to the requests for follow-up interviews that were sent once a month. We recommend researchers tailor (and evaluate) the number and frequency of interviews in longitudinal research based on research goals and participants’ own understanding of meaningful changes. Granted, this highly personalized and open-ended approach may pose logistical and analytical challenges, which should be considered against potential research design benefits.

Second, our participants were early career professionals employed by organizations located in the United States. Even though we made conscious efforts to include different voices (among 22 participants, 6 were Asian, 2 Black, and 1 Hispanic), our focus on white-collar workers within a single country requires consideration of the findings within the North American context. A fruitful direction for future research would be to examine if and to what extent this study’s findings are relevant to early career professionals’ experiences across different cultural and sociopolitical contexts.

Third, our purposive sample included early career professionals working in a variety of industries and organizations, helping to understand liminality as their common experience rather than a unique feature of socialization in a certain industry or organization. However, the differences in participants’ backgrounds meant that our analysis could not capture cohort-level experiences of liminality. Future research may consider conducting a longitudinal study of early career professionals from a single organization (e.g., Beyer & Hannah, 2002), or alternatively, examine how they cope with liminality through joining a network of early career professionals (e.g., social media use).

Finally, our focus on the early career stage and inclusion of individuals with undergraduate and graduate degrees (master’s and doctorate) resulted in participant ages ranging from 22 to 41. This, combined with our relatively small sample, limited our ability to explore liminality as a potential generational phenomenon, which could provide interesting insights. Future research, utilizing larger datasets, could compare different generations of employees to investigate the extent to which liminality is a prevalent aspect of work experience for a specific generation and the reasons behind it. Possibly, this exploration might show that liminality is a common feature of contemporary work environments due to shifting labor practices and organizational volatility, affecting workers across generations.

Data availability

The data underlying this article cannot be shared publicly due to the privacy of individuals that participated in the study. The de-identified data will be shared on reasonable request to the corresponding author.

Funding

This research was supported by the faculty summer research funds from the College of Communication and Information at the University of Tennessee (2019) and from the School of Communication and Information at Rutgers University (2021–2022).

Conflict of interest

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the three anonymous reviewers and the editor, Steve Wilson, for their valuable feedback and suggestions.

Notes

References