Belonging beyond the organisation: Situated learning and identity in liminal boundary roles
研究大学商业孵化器管理者如何在跨机构、空间和社会边界中学习，发现学习发生在外部社群而非所属组织，并提出了边界跨越学习轨迹框架。
This article explores how learning occurs within the liminal spaces inhabited by university business incubator managers, whose roles require continual negotiation of institutional, spatial and social boundaries. Drawing on situated learning theory and the concept of communities of practice, the study examines how learning is socially constructed across shifting contexts rather than within a single, stable environment to determine how incubator managers learn to negotiate organisational and institutional boundaries and how and where such learning occurs. Using a longitudinal, ethnographically informed study of 12 incubator managers, a three-stage process was identified: learning about, learning by doing and recognising knowledge. These stages illustrate how individuals develop liminality competences that enable navigation of competing institutional logics. The findings show that liminality competence is not a static capability but a developmental learning trajectory; that learning and identity reconstruction are mutually reinforcing during sustained liminality and that belonging forms where learning occurs, not necessarily where one is employed. Learning was most actively situated in external communities such as science parks, business associations and regional networks, which became the primary locus of expertise and identification contributing to research on liminality, workplace learning and identity. This study introduces the ‘Trajectory of Boundary-Spanning Learning’ framework.