Research on visibility has provided insights into how others perceive the visible, yet there has been little consideration of how visible employees process and manage their own visibility. We develop a grounded theory model of the internal experience of visibility through 52 interviews conducted with micro-celebrities, or individuals famous in a specific community. We find that after becoming visible, these individuals are dropped into a “pressurized environment” that stimulates their desires and expectations about their visibility. These individuals then make choices surrounding their reactions to and strategies to manage their high visibility. Our findings reveal four visibility management approaches that capture their focus, presentation, and primary audience and prompt a unique set of consequences for the individual. Our grounded process model serves as an initial step in uncovering how the visible feel about their own visibility.
