From my point of view, it is not the coach who becomes world champion, it is a team. Not just the players who played, but the whole squad, and also the team behind the team. Because if you want to achieve success, the whole team has to work perfectly, like a machine, and all the pieces of the puzzle need to fit together into one picture.
You shouldn't be scared of putting together a team made up of experts who are better than the coach in some aspects... So for me personally, it was important to have people in my environment who discuss things with me, who give me their opinions, but who are loyal to me and who are reliable.
I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4 A.M. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends.
Writing nonfiction is more like sculpture, a matter of shaping the research into the finished thing. Novels are like paintings, specifically watercolors. Every stroke you put down you have to go with. Of course you can rewrite, but the original strokes are still there in the texture of the thing.