After looming large in the Abbott office - and by his side - it's hardly surprising Peta Credlin thinks the man who deposed him has been a bitter disappointment.
But the former chief-of-staff is here to help.
Credlin, acknowledging her late father's saying that free advice is worth what you pay for it, has some of her own for Malcolm Turnbull as he prepares to mark one year in the top job.
"The first and most urgent task is that the prime minister must get his mojo back," she writes in The Australian on Monday.
From the sidelines she remarks the man who likes to be liked often looks unsure and wounded, as though he can't comprehend the tight election result.
"Take it from someone who's had her share of tough press, resilience is paramount. Get over it and rebuild," Credlin advises.
His recent overseas visits to attend global summits had been a good start, but Mr Turnbull needed to use his key attributes - commanding, urbane, charming when necessary, bright and ruthless - with colleagues and the crossbench.
Credlin believes he should put regular catch-up calls to marginal backbench MPs in his diary, work on getting his "charming side" out there and embrace the mass media, especially radio.
"While media on the left barracked him into the job, mainstream media will keep him it in," she says.
He should go on FM radio and Sky News and do an interview with outspoken conservatives Andrew Bolt or Paul Murray.
"It won't be easy but the base doesn't want Labor: they just want the coalition to do better," she writes.
And the prime minister shouldn't under-estimate or over-estimate the power of social media and should steer clear of media stunts.
"Governments need gravitas especially with a one-seat majority," Credlin says.
Start with the basics and just get on with it, she adds.
Liberal backbencher Dean Smith said goading prime ministers about their lack of achievement on their first anniversary in the job had become a national sport.
Other former prime ministers Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd had copped it too.
"It's just how things are," he told parliament.
"But it doesn't make the charge accurate."
Senator Smith named the Turnbull government's competition reforms, creation of jobs in South Australia and attempts to tackle budget repair as significant achievements in the prime minister's first year.
"It's true that in this country at the moment it's very hard to please everybody all the time," he said.
"When you scratch the surface, indeed there are opportunities to be positive about the achievements that a Turnbull government has been able to make thus far."
