We all know what it’s like to be the new kid on the block. It can be particularly daunting when that block is a work environment, particularly a culture that feels foreign to you. There’s a lot of advice out there, including feeling out coworkers and supervisors to learn more about the culture. But how do you know who to ask?

Work environments break down into two types of groups, formal and informal. Formal groups are clearly defined, whether by team or organizational chart structure, with established levels of leadership and support. Informal groups are more elusive, yet, they can have a significant impact on how productive and effective an organization operates. Often, it’s far easier for you, the new employee to impress the boss than it is to impress co-workers, particularly if you are perceived as upsetting the applecart.

Remember the 1988 movie, “Big,” starring Tom Hanks? Well, that was a humorous, insightful glimpse into how formal and informal groups exist within an organization. Tom Hanks’s character, Josh Baskin, gets a data entry job, working in a sea of cubicle-bound data entry clerks (an informal group in this environment), including cubicle neighbor, Scotty, played by Jon Lovitz. As Josh, with the typical teenage boy’s enthusiasm for computers, starts powering through his tasks at dizzying speed, Scotty, dismayed, hisses at him to slow down, warning him that he’ll make everyone else look bad, thereby exerting the threat of non-acceptance by the group. While Josh’s industry and enthusiasm irritates co-workers, it impresses the boss sufficiently to leapfrog him at an unprecedented rate into executive level. As a vice president, he leaves the data entry informal group behind only to find himself bumping up hard against the informal group of upper executives, completely alienated. They resist him because he hasn’t worked his way up through the ranks as they have, and they are thrown off balance by this outsider who has suddenly raised the bar by dazzling the chairman without making any effort to adhere to the power structure of the informal group. Josh has inconceivably launched himself to the upper hierarchy but has no support system, no peer groups, to work alongside. He is vulnerable.

Informal groups can either be your best friend or your worst enemy. Often, a new employee must execute some rather tricky dance steps between impressing his new employer and cultivating the clique, particularly its leadership. Acceptance ranks virtually at the top of the list when evaluating job satisfaction. People want to be liked, to be accepted, to feel that they’re part of the organization on a social level as well as a professional one.

When a new person enters the organization, they unwittingly upset the balance and the equilibrium must find a way to re-establish itself. But, while everyone else in the group knows their role and needs only to get acquainted with the single new person, that new person must learn every person’s role in both the formal and informal groups. It can be daunting. While you’re trying to find your way, they’ll be testing you to see if you’re easygoing and fun to work with, as well as competent, or if you’re a loner instead of a team player.

Informal groups, when working in a positive manner, enhance efficiency and make the members feel a vital part of things, not just one individual in an entire square block of desks, a drone as it were. Being part of an informal group is empowering. Everyone in the group has an established role and it’s instinctive for a group member to be a bit territorial if they feel you are treading on their toes or encroaching on their turf.

Overt aggression is typically forbidden in professional settings so employees often resort to passive-aggressive behavior as the new person seeks to find their place in the scheme of things. “I’ll show you the ropes,” can be well meaning or it can be someone’s way of saying, “This is how WE do it, and it’s how you’ll do it if you want to fit in here.” It can be awkward if your boss asks you to take on a task and you’re met with, “Don’t worry yourself about this. I always take care of it.” In other words, hands off.

Learning to identify these groups and cultivate the relationships they present are critical to surviving in an office environment. Here are several tips to make the transition easier:

*Absorb and analyze your surroundings—observe how others interact, the hours they work, their habits, their ways of communicating, how they dress. All these will clue you in to best assimilating into the team.
*Listen more than you speak—avoid discussing at length how you did things at previous jobs, as your co-workers (and bosses) can interpret this as you asserting that your way is the superior way.
*Ask more questions and express less opinions—don’t be too quick to discount the experience of your co-workers who are part of the well-oiled machine. Ask them for advice, and show a willingness to hear what they have to say. If you “diss” a colleague with years under their belt, they may even withhold helpful information that might cause you difficulties down the road.
*Work hard, but not too hard. It’s important when starting out to demonstrate your competence through diligence. Contribute where you can, and be helpful to co-workers without being too helpful. You don’t want to be seen as trying too hard; neither do you want to be perceived as trying to outshine everyone. No one likes a suck-up. Be a valuable part of the team, not a soloist.

There’s no guaranteed way to avoid friction when you’re the “newbie,” however, it’s helpful to remember that any disturbance is caused not by you but simply the circumstance; that the previous balance of the workplace has been inevitably tilted slightly by the arrival of someone—anyone—new. Remembering this can take the sting out of any resistance you may feel at first.

Proceed thoughtfully and you’ll soon know who your new allies are and where you fit in. If you’re still not sure, remember those wise words of Ralph Waldo Emerson: “When the eyes say one thing, and the tongue another, a practiced man relies on the language of the first.”