Much planning went into Malcolm Turnbull's lunge for the top job, writes Laurie Oakes
IT'S now obvious that Malcolm Turnbull was not just thinking about how to become prime minister in the months leading up to his ousting of Tony Abbott. He was also giving careful consideration to what he would do once he got the job.
That sweeping reshuffle was not the result of hurried discussions over a weekend. Clearly a lot of planning had gone into it. And ministers quickly found that the new PM had strong ideas on what he wanted done. 
Appointing a Minister for Cities and the Built Environment, for example, was smart. So smart it seems remarkable that it was not done earlier. The vast bulk of Australians live in capital cities. They are responsible for 80 per cent of the nation's GDP.
Jamie Briggs, as he slotted in to the new portfolio, was left in no doubt about how engaged the prime minister is. He had three long meetings with Turnbull in the first week.
Abbott's insistence that federal assistance go only to roads and not to public transport - described by Briggs as an "ideological" ban - was dumped.
Another symbol of change. And now the photographs and video we've seen of Turnbull on buses, trains and trams over the years provide him with policy credibility.
Turnbull's tone of optimism and emphasis on the future was obviously the result of careful thought and workshopping, too. Perhaps there had even been some polling.
It was there from the start, central to Turnbull's statement announcing his leadership challenge. A weapon against Abbott, but also and more importantly a way forward for a reinvigorated government under new leadership.
This sort of thing does not happen spontaneously. Some kind of transition blueprint was put together in advance. It is something else for the pro-Abbott conspiracy theorists to chew over when they tire of attacking Scott Morrison.
Turnbull might have come to the prime ministership suddenly, but he arrived with an agenda. He knows what he is doing and what he wants done.
And his style is just about as un-Abbottlike as it is possible to be. Abbott's final interview with Leigh Sales on the ABC's 7.30 program was notorious for his answer, when asked about economic policy, that "we stopped the boats".
When Turnbull appeared on the same show after the swearing in of his ministry there was no such slithering. He spoke conversationally instead of reciting formulaic answers and was not afraid to think carefully about a question before responding.
Some Liberal MPs, along with a handful of right-wing ideologues in the media, might still be in mourning, but Abbott is unlamented by the general populace.
It is as though Australians regarded him as part of the Rudd-Gillard era they have been trying to forget. Not until he was gone could that chapter really be closed.
The leadership change has made a considerable difference to the Coalition's fortunes. If the opinion polls weren't convincing enough, that warm applause the new PM received on Thursday when he boarded a Melbourne tram should be.
Labor takes heart from Turnbull's failure when he led the Liberals briefly in opposition. It is hoping desperately that the old flaws - arrogance, micromanagement, and an astonishing temper - will reassert themselves.
Labor MPs would have found the appearance of Barnaby Joyce on Four Corners last Monday chilling.
The National Party firebrand, who played a key role in the toppling of Turnbull last time, looked directly at the camera and announced: "Turnbull is going to beat Shorten and everyone in the Labor Party knows that too." It was not bravado. It was not spin. It was conviction.
Finally, before he heads off to a new life as a diplomat in Washington, a few words on Joe Hockey.
Hockey made mistakes as Treasurer, but he was not brought undone by cigars or gaffes about poor people not driving cars. What did for him was last year's Budget of broken promises.
Many were promises that could not be kept and should not have been made. It was Abbott, not Hockey, who made them.Laurie Oakes is the Nine Network's political editor.