Impact of COVID-19 on search in an organisation

Abstract

COVID-19 has created unprecedented organisational challenges, yet no study has examined the impact on information search. A case study in a knowledge-intensive organisation was undertaken on 2.5 million search queries during the pandemic. A surge of unique users and COVID-19 search queries in March 2020 may equate to ‘peak uncertainty and activity’, demonstrating the importance of corporate search engines in times of crisis. Search volumes dropped 24% after lockdowns; an ‘L-shaped’ recovery may be a surrogate for business activity. COVID-19 search queries transitioned from awareness, to impact, strategy, response and ways of working that may influence future search design. Low click through rates imply some information needs were not met and searches on mental health increased. In extreme situations (i.e. a pandemic), companies may need to move faster, monitoring and exploiting their enterprise search logs in real time as these reflect uncertainty and anxiety that may exist in the enterprise.

Surveillance as information practice

“…827-830), and gave rise to "self-protective information behaviours" (p. 832). Montesi (2021) focused on how peoples' information behaviors were the object of online surveillance during the COVID-19 pandemic (see also Cleverley et al, 2021). Potnis & Halladay (2022, p. 1625 framed "information control as a practice that is constituted through a constellation of information-related choices and activities," and they explicitly recognized surveillance as a mechanism of information control, at least at the governmental level (p. 1624).…”

“…827–830), and gave rise to “self‐protective information behaviours” (p. 832). Montesi (2021) focused on how peoples’ information behaviors were the object of online surveillance during the COVID‐19 pandemic (see also Cleverley et al, 2021).…”

Chaos, expansion, and contraction: The information worlds of depression patients during theCOVID‐19 pandemic lockdown

“…In addition, Cleverley et al (2021) gave us an organizational perspective across countries. Their analysis of search logs in the first few months of the pandemic proved that “uncertainty and activity peak[ed]” after the lockdown measures in March 2020, followed by a 24% postlockdown decrease in search volume and an important surge in mental health information searches since April.…”

Human information behavior during the Covid-19 health crisis. A literature review

“…Once again, the study of online HIB appears to be instrumental, affording predictions of related phenomena, but also making other phenomena visible, such as the greater responsibility put on women regarding exchange of health relevant information, or the anticipation of mental health problems in certain individuals based on the analysis of search queries after lockdown (Cleverley, Cousins, & Burnett, 2021;Thelwall & Thelwall, 2020). Some subthemes emerge that will be discussed in Section 4.6 and that corroborate results of research more directly focused on people, in particular women's role in information exchanges, the connection of online activity with local areas and events, and the changing nature of this activity according to the different stages of the crisis (Cleverley et al, 2021;Husnayain et al, 2020;Singh, Bansal, et al, 2020;Thelwall & Thelwall, 2020;Zhao, Fan, Basnyat, & Hu, 2020). Sarker et al (2020) mine Covid-19 conversations on Twitter to collect user-referred symptoms and find a wide range of symptoms, which, in milder cases, such as anosmia and ageusia, did not appear yet in comparative clinical studies.…”

“…User interactions with digital health tools have also been exploited, to understand their potential in enabling remote care (Perlman et al, 2020). From the perspective of an organization, the analysis of search logs during the first months of the pandemic reflects faithfully its different stages, evidencing a 'peak of uncertainty and activity' in March 2020, just following lockdown measures; a drop of search after lockdown; and an important surge in mental health information search from April onwards (Cleverley et al, 2021).…”