Spotlight Search ignores first character

I've noticed this problem for a while now. I was hoping the latest update to OS X El Capitan would fix it, but it hasn't.

Occasionally, I'll launch spotlight search with ⌘-Space and start typing so quickly that it drops the first character. This probably happens 3-5 times/week, possibly more. I can see the typed character show up briefly for a moment, but then the search bar is cleared when I type my second character.

Yesterday, I got incredibly lucky. I was searching for "Helen" in my contacts, and I happened to stop typing after the first character when this bug occurred:

In this state:

• You can clearly see the initial 'h' I typed,
• You'll notice the cursor has reset all the way to the left.
• Pressing the arrow keys did nothing to move the cursor
• Pressing any other key ('e' for example) caused the entire field to clear & only the other key to remain.

Any thoughts on what I can do to fix this? I've tried nothing, and I'm all out of ideas.

Specs: