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

This article examines the experience of liminality—being in an in-between state—among early career professionals in the United States who simultaneously undergo dual socialization: adapting to their current organization while engaging in vocational and organizational anticipatory socialization (VAS/OAS) for their next career stage. Through a longitudinal qualitative study involving repeat interviews with 22 full-time early career professionals, the research identifies how participants construct liminality as either a planned or emergent phase, the tensions arising from navigating organizational membership alongside future career aspirations, and the communicative strategies they use to manage these tensions. The study proposes a refined socialization model that incorporates voluntary liminality as a distinct phase between encounter and exit, emphasizing permeable organizational boundaries and the dynamic interplay between current organizational integration and future career preparation. Findings highlight the normative nature of liminality in contemporary careers, shaped by factors such as job mobility, organizational change, and external disruptions like the COVID-19 pandemic, and suggest practical implications for managers to support early career employees' complex socialization processes.