The process of professional identity creation in the context of nascent professions where existing frames, expectations, and ideal identities are absent is an area that needs to be explored. We attempt to understand this process in the context of the newly introduced Organ Transplant Coordinator (OTC) profession in India in 2011. Using a qualitative study involving 33 Organ Transplant Coordinators (OTCs), our findings indicate a three-phase process model of professional identity creation involving four forms of social-symbolic work (identity work, emotion work, practice work, and institutional work) that spans three levels-individual, organizational, and societal. Our model explains how micro (individual) and meso (organizational) level interactional socio-symbolic work feeds into the macro-level institutional work (societal) and vice versa, thus creating a self-fulfilling cycle of professional identity creation over time in the context of nascent professions.
