1. He puts himself in the fastest flowing rivers - is clever about being in the right place at the right time - while other businessmen bad-mouthed Trump he put a successful bet on his victory;
2. He has bold aspirations and is the kind of guy who is unreasonable about the level of ambition he sets for teams - a necessary attribute given the scope of disruptive change Trump has signalled;
3. He is extremely focused - takes complex problems, breaks them into parts and makes people responsible for delivering;
4. He has boundless energy and intellectual curiosity - reads widely and looks for big ideas;
5. He is comfortable in uncomfortable situations - and said to be "never the fastest runner in the first five minutes but there when the burn comes on" - another useful attribute when Trump's abrasive personality causes friction.
These were the insights I earlier formed when the businessman was first appointed as an Assistant to the President and Director of Strategic Initiatives in the Trump White House in early 2017. Tempered by my own experience working alongside him in the early days of the NZ US Council, which will tomorrow host a "conversation with Barack Obama" in front of a 1000-strong invited audience.
To the five factors I would now add another - staying power - the ability to stay focused while all around him others were losing their heads.
It's no surprise that Liddell is now driving policy formation under the leadership of chief of staff John Kelly.
He has always been intensely ambitious. But it would be short-sighted to believe it is only 'all about Chris'- although like most super successful executives he has a strong streak of self-interest.
He has long had an interest in what drives national success.
In New Zealand he was one of the driving forces behind the Catching the Knowledge Wave programme that aimed to transform New Zealand. In the United States - where he later moved to have a highly successful career with major executive roles at International Paper, Microsoft and General Motors - he also joined Republican Mitt Romney's campaign for the 2012 presidential election.
Inevitably, there will be speculation that Liddell could ultimately be in line for Kelly's job if the retired Marine Corps general finally gets the Trump Twitter flick.
That would be premature.
But it's not all gloss.
Liddell was earlier passed over by Trump for the powerful role of director of the National Economic Council after Gary Cohn bailed.
While he was still in contention as the public front-runner, The Wall Street Journal's editorial board panned him as having "bad policy instincts". "President Trump says he likes debate among his policy advisers, but his leading candidate to replace Gary Cohn in running the National Economic Council belies that claim," the board said.
"If Mr Trump chooses Christopher Liddell for the job, he'll be elevating a former corporate executive without strong free-market views who is unlikely to counter the growing clout of the antitrade corporatists in the Administration," it said.
"The best one can say about Mr Liddell is that he'd be better in the job of White House economic policy coordinator than Peter Navarro, who is Mr Trump's protectionist-at-large."
As evidence, the WSJ cited an interview with TVNZ's Corin Dann where Liddell said: "I think the days of unbridled free trade and unbridled free markets are over. I worked in the private sector all my life, so I'm a believer in free markets, but not unbridled free markets. And we've had 30 years since the mid-80s, both in New Zealand and here in the US and globally of basically free markets driving the whole thinking, the whole rhetoric around and governing. I think those days are over, personally. I think we're going to go through a circular trend of a much more restrained free market."
Liddell was said to have been sceptical of Trump's tax cuts.
But said the WSJ: "The US economy in the last year has entered a faster growth phase precisely because Mr Trump has promoted the classic free-market remedies of deregulation and lower tax rates to spur more investment and hiring. Mr Liddell sounds like he has the wrong instincts to sustain better times."
Time will tell whether that is indeed the case.
But having this Kiwi in the White House is unlikely to do New Zealand any harm. It may even do some good.
Wouldn't that be terrible.
