SELECT CASE CHARINDEX(' ', @Foo, 1)
     WHEN 0 THEN @Foo -- empty or single word
     ELSE SUBSTRING(@Foo, 1, CHARINDEX(' ', @Foo, 1) - 1) -- multi-word
END

CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[FirstWord] (@value varchar(max))
RETURNS varchar(max)
AS
BEGIN
    RETURN CASE CHARINDEX(' ', @value, 1)
        WHEN 0 THEN @value
        ELSE SUBSTRING(@value, 1, CHARINDEX(' ', @value, 1) - 1) END
END
GO -- test:
SELECT dbo.FirstWord(NULL)
SELECT dbo.FirstWord('')
SELECT dbo.FirstWord('abc')
SELECT dbo.FirstWord('abc def')
SELECT dbo.FirstWord('abc def ghi')