Walking into the lunchroom on the first day of a new job can feel a bit like being the new kid at school.

You don’t know who to sit by. Or where.

For those of us with the slightest bit of an introverted personality, sometimes it is easier to sit at our desk and read a book. Or just keep working as we munch on our sandwich.

Don’t.

One of the most important career moves you can make for yourself is to take the time at lunch to get to know your co-workers. Ask them about their lives, tell them about yours.

If you are uncomfortable talking about your personal life, find out about their professional life. How did they come to this company, what have they learned, what are their goals?

As we have PCS’d from place to place my first friends have almost always been those I’ve made at work. This year our office hired an intern from across the country.

I remember my days as an intern fondly. Lots to do, lots to learn, lots of mistakes. But it was a glorious time of learning and exploring and reaching out beyond my boundaries. I made lifelong friends and mentors. I loved it.

But for our new intern, the Deep South is a tough transition from her home in the Pacific Northwest. She was stunned. She was homesick. And rather than reach out to us, every day at lunch she shut her office door. She left early. We barely heard her at all.

Rather than learn about her new environment, she made fun of it. Our pleasant small talk was met with ridicule and attitude.

And suddenly, she was alone.

When she needed help, the tight-knit office that had worked together for a decade wasn’t interested.

Ouch.

Another employee and I who had only started in the last year approached her to talk about how important those professional relationships are and how she could work toward building them with her new co-workers.

She roller her eyes slightly. Oh, that’s going great. I think I’ve done a great job of that. We talk all the time, she told us.

The icy reception she receives every time she walks through the lobby tells us otherwise.

She is going to have a very long, lonely year.

Reach out to your co-workers. They are your friends, your confidantes and your biggest supporters for eight hours of the day, or more.  When you shut them out, you intentionally make every day on the job much harder than it needs to be.