You might have a requirement to use different attributes (for example Employee type) to scope user searches in the Portal, so when a client's manager logs in the portal their searches will be on attributes that are not built in. Out of the box you can only select certain attribues.
How can you add other attributes to this list that are in the directory to the Portal Searches under Elements?
To do this, login to the Portal admin interface and click on the Setup menu at the top.
On the left menu that appears, click on "Managed Object Attributes".
This will show a list of attributes and how they are mapped to Identity Manager attributes. There is also a "Searchable" field here which must be checked to be available in searches. At the bottom of this list, you can click "Add User Attribute" to add a new attribute and have it available in searches.