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

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.