Office survival tip?

I've been reading Emanuel Rosen's The Anatomy of Buzz in nibbles during the last week or so. Lots of goodies there, if you're willing to gnaw your way through some over-explained parts. But it only just dawned on me that there's actually a tasty bit of info. in the anecdote (on page 151) that made me laugh when I read it last night.

Russ Bernard, a researcher, had been with a group studying cliques that form in prisons. In his group's work with hundreds of cliques, the network ties always made sense: Race, geography and even--oddly enough--the type of crime committed. Except for one. Then the unexplainable clique escaped together: Mystery solved! (Oops.)

Where I work is far too small--and too naturally tight-knit anyway--for me to explore the ramifications of this insight in workaday life. But should I, by unhappy happenstance, again find myself in a large and unfamiliar office space, it's a tool I'll try to remember is in my toolbag. If you want to find the trouble-makers (in both the good and bad senses of the term), look for the cliques that have no visible context. At least, that's the tip I'm drawing from this anecdote.