On the evening John Olsen seized the Premiership from Dean Brown half way through his first term – following 10 long years in Opposition – Mike Rann went wandering the halls of Parliament House.

As Opposition Leader, Mike often walked the halls and gleaned lots of useful tidbits from people of various political persuasions.

On this night, Olsen was off somewhere celebrating his victory. So out of mild curiosity Mike walked into the Premier’s office to have a look. And there, sitting alone and still quite stunned, was Dean Brown. The two of them began to talk.

That was not a scenario that played out well for John Olsen as Premier.

Olsen was so consumed with his own ambitions, he made the fundamental error of not thinking through the real consequences of this extreme action. In effect, Olsen had created two Opposition leaders – one from without and one from within.

This situation and the way it ultimately unfolded provided a textbook lesson in how not to become leader – unless you want to burden a Premiership and Government with irrevocable grief and division.

It proved there are certain rules in politics that are ignored at the peril of its players.

Rule number one – expect and plan for internecine warfare on a fairly egregious scale when deposing a first-term leader.

Rule two – if attempting this desperate course of action, be 10 times better at the job than the hapless incumbent.

Rules number three and four: Be extraordinary. Don’t not be extraordinary.

Julia Gillard seemed to ignore rule number one, tried hard with rule number two, but failed the test on three and four.

This Federal Labor Government has achieved more in the past six years than most other Federal Governments in modern times. Its reform agenda has been vast and impressive. Its infrastructure build has been transformational. It overcame the global financial crisis with barely a blip. It has, in a minority government, pushed through more than 500 pieces of good legislation the impact of which will still be resonating generations from now – for the disabled, for the aged, for children in schools, for workers, for everyone connected to the NBN. The economy is growing steadily, we are more outward looking than ever before, and we are innovating to stay ahead in certain sectors of global export markets where we are considered formidable competitors. Australia will always grapple with big policy challenges, but right now, the national economy is in rude good health.

There is no question Julia is a brilliant negotiator and has enormous ability. But that’s not where leadership begins and ends.

Julia’s massive nation-building agenda was largely ignored in favor of a national obsession with opinion polls and leadership speculation that just didn’t end. It went on and on. It was tedious and fractious and undermined the body politic.

The question was – who allowed Labor’s message to get so derailed?

Ultimately, it was Julia. Even though Tony Abbott (and arguably Kevin Rudd) ran a sustained campaign of constant negative interference, she needed to outsmart them both.

Her very first job as PM was to tell the good men of women of Australia why they had made a horrible mistake in electing Kevin Rudd as PM. She needed in cold, bold terms to explain why it was necessary to cut him loose. Her failure to do so was just weird and it was a position from which she never recovered ground.

That limp-footed start allowed Julia’s opponents to blur her successes and amplify her failures. When she struggled back into Government after a disastrous election campaign, she again refused to take the people into her confidence to articulate why she broke her carbon tax election promise. It handed Abbott a big stick, which he pounded her with relentlessly.

Leadership can’t be learned. Being a tough warrior isn’t nearly enough. Leadership requires a politician to have excellent instincts, clear thought processes, a head for strategy, a capacity to accept and reject good and bad advice, and a fair degree of rat cunning. They must also be able to campaign well which means having an inherent understanding of the collective will and knowing how to empathise and connect with people. They must be able to talk the talk of ordinary people. And then above all of these skills – they must have the measure of their Opposition and the ability to outwit them more often than not.

A good Prime Minister or a good Premier possesses a breadth of skills very few people will ever achieve. It’s takes a rare talent.

So when I looked at the photo of Julia knitting this week, I just sighed. If she was selling a message, it was lost on me. “I’m a leading Republican feminist trained to make royal baby gifts with my bare hands?” Perhaps not. So, what?

Julia Gillard exposed many contradictions in her character than confounded and confused – and added to her list of woes. In years to come her legacy will judged with far greater acclaim than she could ever achieve now.

Which brings me to Rule number five – if you assume power through a treacherous act, then live by the sword. A knitting needle won’t cut it.

Jill Bottrall is a communications consultant. She was an adviser to former Premier Mike Rann.

This article was first published on her website.