"Have you seen the show The Bachelor?" Steve Dalton (CWR '99) asks. "Why would a woman want to be on that show? The odds of winning are only four percent!"

But we're not really talking about reality television. Dalton, senior career consultant and associate director at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, says the show is a perfect analogy for the modern job search. The contestants vying for the bachelor's attention, he says, illustrate the old-school method of blindly sending out resumes, then waiting and hoping to be selected from the pack. The bachelor, on the other hand, spends his time interviewing the various bachelorettes to determine which one he likes best. He is confident and he has lots of options.

Dalton's advice for the seekers in today's job market? "Be the bachelor."

Dalton's new book, The 2-Hour Job Search (published in March by Random House's Ten Speed Press), is the exact opposite of what he refers to as the usual "squishy and vague" job search advice. (If you've ever wondered what "use your network" means, you're not alone.)

Instead of the "mail and wait" approach, Dalton breaks the job search process down into three direct steps: prioritize, contact and convince.

Prioritizing requires job seekers to strategically build and sort a list of potential employers based on factors that include things like motivation and interest, how many open positions a company has and whether or not there is a preexisting network of fellow alumni.

Once the list is in place, it's time to start making contacts—with the ultimate goal of finding a personal advocate within each company. Some people will never get back to you, Dalton cautions, but that's a good thing. You only want to spend time doing informational interviews with people who not only mean well, but who will take action to help you.

"Too many people approach the job search as if it's a slot machine," Dalton says, "masochistically and mindlessly submitting resumes and hoping 'one more play' will result in a jackpot. In reality, it's more like poker, where superior strategy, nerve and skill will produce far superior results."

Q&A for Job Hunters

/ Will finding a job be easier when the economy picks up? "A lot of people think it's a terrible time to be looking for a job, but even as the economy improves, online postings will always be overwhelmed," Dalton says. That's why, more than ever, job seekers need a systematic, tech-savvy approach. /

/ Is it easier to find a job when you have a job? 'Not necessarily,' Dalton says. 'If you stay in the same field, it's probably easier. If you are changing careers, it can be very hard to pull your head out of a mediocre job that amplifies all of your weaknesses." /

/ Is multitasking really a valuable skill? According to Dalton, multitasking is—at best—a bad habit. The key to an efficient job search is staying on task. "Don't click on anything that isn't relevant," he says. "This minimizes cognitive drift." /