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Enterprise Search: The Batista Madoff Syndrome

Two examples flapped around my aging mind this chilly and dark Sunday, January 4, 2009. I am not sure why I woke up with the names Batista and Madoff juxtaposed. I walked my dogs, Tess (my SharePoint expert) and Tyson (my Google Search Appliance dude). I asked, “How can experts be so wrong?” Both looked at me. Here’s a picture of their inquiring minds directing their attention toward me.

Forget Batista and Madoff. We want breakfast.

On our walk in the pre-dawn gloaming, I thought about Felix Batista. In mid-December 2008, Mr. Batista (a security consultant and anti-kidnapping expert) was kidnapped. Although tragic, I wondered how a kidnapping expert in Mexico to give a talk about thwarting kidnapping could get himself snatched that day. I was reminded of search experts recommending a system that did not work. I have been in some interesting situations where kidnapping and mortar attacks were on the morning’s agenda. I am no kidnapping or mortar blast expert. But I figured out how to avoid trouble, and I just used commonsense. I am not as well known as Felix Batista, of course, but the risk of trouble was high. I did not encounter a direct threat even though I was in a high risk situation. I wondered, “What was this expert doing in the wrong place and the right time anyway?” (Please, read this brief and gentle account of Mr. Batista’s travails here.)

Now Bernard Madoff, the fellow who took a Ponzi scheme to new heights. I am not concerned about Mr. Madoff. What I thought about was the headline on the dead tree version of the Wall Street Journal: “Me, Madoff and the Mind: How a Gullibility Expert Was Scammed.” Another expert, another smarter-than-me person proven to be somewhat dull. I suppose that the notions of trust, ethical behavior, and honesty get mixed into the colors of expertise and knowledge. Mr. Madoff is colored a most disturbing shade of brown.

Common Themes

What do these two unrelated incidents have in common? That was the question I pondered on my early morning walk. Let me capture my thoughts before they flap away:

First, the cult of the expert has been a big part of my work at Nuclear Utility Services (a unit of Halliburton) and Booz, Allen & Hamilton (the pre-break up and messy divorce version, thank you). Experts are easy to find in nuclear energy. A mistake can be reasonably exciting. As a result, most of the people involved in the nuclear industry (classified and unclassified versions) are careful. When errors occur, really bad things happen. The quality assurance fad did not sweep the nuclear industry. Nuclear-related work had to be correct. Get it wrong and you have Chernobyl. Nuclear is not a zero defect operation. Nothing done by humans can be. If a nuclear expert were alive, that was one easy and imperfect way determine that the expert knew something. When nuclear experts are wrong, you get pretty spectacular problems.

Visualization of the Chernobyl radiation. Source: http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2006/04/chernobyl_radia.html

At Booz, Allen & Hamilton in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the meaning of the word “expert” was a bit softer than at Halliburton NUS. BAH (as it was then known) had individuals with what the firm called “deep industry experience”. I learned that a recent MBA qualified as an expert for some engagements. The clients were gullible or wanted to believe that Mr. Booz’s 1917 could work its magic for International Harvester or the Department of the Navy. Some BAH professionals had quite a bit of post graduate training in a discipline generally related to the person’s area of expertise. I am still not clear what a Ph.D. in business means. Perhaps I can ask one of Mr. Madoff’s investors this question? The problem was that a BAH expert was not like a Halliburton NUS expert. My boss–Dr. William P. Sommers–told me that Halliburton NUS was a C+ outfit. BAH, he asserted, was an A+ shop. I nodded eagerly because I knew what was required to remain a BAH professional. I did not agree then nor do I agree now. Some of the consultants from the 1970s, like consultants today, have awarded themselves the title of expert. I can point to a recent study of enterprise search as evidence that this self-propagation is practiced today as it was in 1970.

I think Messrs. Batista and Madoff are closer to the BAH type of expert than the geek able to handle a nuclear core refueling calculation. A business consultant’s mistakes can be just as devastating, so expertise whether hard or soft can be pretty potent when the advice is just plain wrong.

Second, most experts in my experience have soft skills. These are difficult to measure. I can hear this objection, “Mr. Madoff worked with numbers. Numbers are objective.” My response is that if Mr. Madoff’s skills were number centric, how did he manage to accept a deposit six days before his arrest? Wouldn’t the numbers show that something was amiss? He did cook up an alleged $50 billion scheme, right? The reality is that the soft experts created a problem similar to nuclear waste. No one had the knowledge, time, or inclination to see what the “experts” were really doing. I bet Messrs. Batista and Madoff were really popular in college and are still in demand for a golf foursome. Nuclear engineers may not be the life of the party, but you make friends quickly when you need their expertise to avoid sending your dosimeter into hyperdrive.

Third, in the aftermath of mistakes by experts more experts are trying to figure out what went wrong. On my walk, I realized that in today’s world, expertise is a fuzzy concept. Consultants, therefore, can make a recommendation today, get paid, and not have to worry about the consequences of their “certain blindness” for years, maybe decades. Clients, competitors, even regulatory entities don’t know or don’t look below the surface sheen. Journalists are busy working on their résumés or chasing engaging specialists who can generate a juicy quote on demand. Business professionals, of which an increasing number are entitlement or trophy generation kids grown older, assume that their native intelligence is sufficient to detect problems, scams, and bad decisions.

And Enterprise Search?

Most senior managers know zero about search and information access. The notion that Google is information retrieval is the lowest common denominator among most working professionals. Within the last two or three years, the senior managers with whom I have had contact alternate between heads down crashing on a task and running around trying to fight fires. Employees and consultants to these top dogs’s organizations believe that they have the expertise to locate the information needed to make a decision or perform a task. Most organizations have an expert, maybe dozens, but these individuals often focus their attention on their job or the task a big dog gives them. One of the interesting problems in programming is that an expert will say, “Are you sure you want me to do X?” When the big dog says, “Do it.” The programmer snickers and does the job. The result is the dissatisfaction with craziness of some enterprise search implementations and systems. Some are huge enterprise code monsters that sap an organization’s agility.

Because everyone thinks he or she is an expert in search, the task of figuring out how to deliver needed information to employees goes wildly off track. Most organizations hire a “search expert” to assist in the project. Because the procurement team or the information technology manager assumes that he or she knows what’s what, there is no effective way to assess the work of the “search expert”.

The result is a spectacular blind-leading-the-blind situation.

Therefore, the Batista-Madoff syndrome is a business situation where expertise is not anchored in factual data. The Batista contribution is the arrogance of the expert who doesn’t know when trouble is looming. The Madoff contribution is the gullibility of the people who believe that someone can deliver magic. When Batista and Madoff combine, you get a very expensive and potentially non recoverable situation. I call this the high risk feedback loop, which is part of the Batista Madoff syndrome.

The expert-trophy client feedback loop. No outside inputs required.

You scoff, “How can Chernobyl and a Ponzi scheme relate to our little search project?”

Good question.

The assumption that enterprise search is simple, something that amateurs comfortable with Google, can handle is a widespread one. Google does the search for most of its users. So, knowledge of Google is not knowledge at all. Getting a useful from result from Google is like the pigeon my Psychology 105 professor trained to peck a handle to get a bit of food. Now, I think this assertion of mine will make some readers angry. Too bad. If offended, you need to sit down and think about what Google does to deliver useful information and then what you have to implement to achieve a similar result for your enterprise search users. Oh, too much work? Or, too busy? Or, we have a consultant to do that?

Enterprise search does require expertise comparable to that of a nuclear engineer Search may may demand an even higher order of expertise. Knowledge is a pretty tough problem to crack. When the management guidance or the requirements for the search system are based on watching a rerun of Star Trek, the system may not be able to meet those expectations. In fact, the newly minted expert may not be able to alter the trajectory of the enterprise search task. Experts just go with the flow.

Here’s an example. I received an email outlining an organization’s need for a range of functions, including mash ups and personalization. I suggested a requirements discussion and a preliminary cost analysis. The email writer wanted a demo. Nuts. Those viewing the demo will see the fake services and say, “We want that.” Without requirements and costs, the organization is unlikely to have the resources to deliver on the promise of the demo. Another search disaster in the works. Hopefully it will not be an enterprise search Chernobyl or a Madoff situation.

Wrap Up

The Batista Madoff system becomes self-propagating until reality intruded in the form of kidnappers or investors who wanted their money back. I am now on the look out for the Batista-Madoff Syndrome, an official clinical issue in enterprise search. Now, help clarify my early morning thoughts. My two technical advisors this morning have not been overly helpful. It’s breakfast time.

Stephen Arnold, January 4, 2009

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