Maybe it's true that according to statistics, the majority of married couples were introduced to each other, but don't singles dream of Mr. and Mrs. Perfect entering their lives in a more romantic, more natural sort of way?

Let's face it, if you are out of school and in the working world, how many opportunities do you have to meet a potential dating partner out of the blue? It is very rare for someone with the right qualifications to sit down next to you on a park bench or on the train. Yet some people expect to magically bump into the right person some day, even if they spend long hours on their job, eat all their lunches with co-workers, drag themselves home feeling exhausted, and spend what is left of their evening eating a take-out dinner in front of the television.

You might be attracted to someone you meet at a party or a club, but if and when the two of you actually start to date, you may discover that you don't have much in common, or you dislike the personality or they are just plain weird. So if we don't have that many opportunities to meet suitable dating partners on our own, why not explore other ways to find someone?

What are the alternatives? You don't expect singles to advertise themselves in the "Soul Mate Wanted" section of the newspaper I presume.

At many of our programs, Rosie and I suggest that our audiences approach the search for a dating partner, the kind of partner with whom they would like to develop a good relationship that can lead to marriage, the same way that they would approach the search for a job. Let's say that my company was just taken over and my whole department was given pink slips. In two weeks I have to pack up my desk and move out to greener pastures. Will there be a greener pasture for me to go to? Not unless I make a major effort to find it. And so what do I do? I perfect my resume; I add information that's relevant to how my career has developed, and the kind of person I have become over the past few years. I polish my shoes, I make sure my suits look good, get a haircut. I network with everyone I know to let them understand what has happened and ask them if they can refer me to a firm or an individual who might be interested in hiring someone with my qualifications. I scan the "want" ads and I register with headhunters. I research background information about possible employers and I even practice how I'm going to behave on a job interview. I try to be realistic. I know that I'm not going to be hired on the first look, and I expect that if things are promising I'll be called back a couple of times before the firm will make its decision. Nevertheless, even at the beginning I try to make my best impression. I want to make my best effort to find the best possible job, one that has a good future, so that I can support myself and maintain my sense of self worth.