1. Keep in touch with good business contacts. Ring them, invite them to premieres, make sure they know who you are. Good personal relationships are the key to good business relationships.
2. Buy flowers for your staff. It’s an easy way to say thanks.
3. Know how to do other people’s jobs. I had to step into the rigging as a lighting technician when we ran out of money to hire one for a tour. The audience couldn’t see most of the actors, but we didn’t have to cancel.
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4. Don’t let work parties become your only social life. It’s true that plenty of useful work is done in bars, but make sure you don’t spend every night there. It’s important to have friends outside work.
5. Take style advice from your work experience person. He or she will have a much better idea of fashion than any magazine.
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6. Know when not to follow lesson 5. Some professions don’t condone tight purple trousers.
7. Think about what your successor will find in your desk when you leave. I took over a job only to find a half-bottle of brandy in the bottom drawer. I assumed the worst.
8. Try to learn from the person you replaced. That half-bottle came in handy when calming nervous actors.
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9. Be very nice to the secretaries of MDs you’re trying to impress. The paths of many of my funding applications have been smoothed by friendly assistants.