If you’re looking for an internal search solution you’ve probably heard the term Enterprise Search kicking around.  It generally applies putting in an internal search solution that can broadly index content (file shares, email, SharePoint, etc) and provide a search interface for your employees.

It assumes a few things.  First, that the solution applies to all employees.  After all, don’t all employees need the ability to search through their knowledge work?  Isn’t search just like email?  The key flawed assumption: all employees share the same underlying search problem.

I certainly agree from a strategy perspective.  An Enterprise Search Strategy can help identify the holistic approach to rolling out and implementing a search solution.  That may be where the usefulness of the term ‘Enterprise’ ends.

I think it is more constructive to think of search in the way you currently think of your database platform.  Don’t databases require real business applications to be useful to their end users?  Would you attempt to justify the purchase of a database without the needs of a specific group of users in mind?  Search solutions should be approached the same way – they have a specific set of users in mind, and the solution should be tuned to provide the best search experience possible.

Here is a clear symptom of that problematic assumption: are you having a hard time building a Enterprise Search business case?  If the search solution is inexpensive, like a Google Search Appliance or Microsoft Search Server, then a business case isn’t as important and you probably are using the ‘we just need it’ argument to justify the expense.  That’s valid.  However, if you are spending significantly more on a platform like FAST or Autonomy,  you need a solid business case.  One of the best ways to accomplish that is to know specifically who the solution is for, and precisely what benefit you’ll drive by deploying it.  That concept contradicts the ‘Enterprise’ assumption we often start with.

My suggestion: look for a group of users that share a common knowledge discovery challenge, and work on building a search solution and a business case around them.  Look for a group that is large enough to support a business case, but not so large that their job functions diverge and therefore their search needs are too broad.  Also, establish an overall Enterprise Search Strategy so this and future search solutions can fit into a cohesive plan.