I am hoping for some advice regarding the social culture at my firm. I’m an extrovert, so this is honestly really impacting my feelings about my job. I’m starting my fourth year, and have been at the same firm all three years of practice.
I do have some friends at work who I would consider “work friends”—I.e. don’t really see them outside of work but we’re social in work settings. However, I feel pretty ostracized by other associates.
In general, while there are some partners who I get along well with, I don’t feel like any particular partner has taken a strong interest in working with me or helping me grow as a lawyer. This is different from past workplaces, where I always felt like my supervisors cared about me and wanted me to succeed. I feel like they see me as a work monkey who they could easily replace (which may be true, but it still doesn’t feel good).
With the other associates, other than the ones who I’d consider work friends, I feel like they are extremely cliquey and honestly kind of rude. The corporate and litigation groups (with the majority of associates) really stick to their own groups. I’m the only associate in my niche regulatory practice, and am on a different floor of the building. I don’t mix with the other associates too much and, when I do, they are clear about their in-groups. It’s to the point where sometimes, at firm events, I’ll go try and strike up conversation with them and they’ll do the thing where nobody will respond to my contributions to the conversation and they’ll just move on. Feels at times like they are acting like I’m not there.
I have an active social life outside of work through sports and hobbies, but I’m an extrovert and hate spending so much of my week in this antisocial work setting. I don’t typically have problems like this, so I’m not sure if there’s anything in particular I’m doing to bug them.
Does anyone have any advice for dealing with a weird firm social culture?