I'm quite new at doing full-time research as a career. It seems that everyone in my department whom I talk with is focused not only on "their" research but also on various side projects with other researchers — Including people who are newer than I am. What am I not doing which they are? — I don't want to simply go to everyone I meet and ask "what exactly are you doing, and do you need help with it?" (it sounds rather artificial/forced/desperate/etc.).

This is closely related to an already-existing question about approaching researchers about (potential) collaboration, but if I don't even know who to approach, then the answer(s) to that question are not very useful.