After winning the 1928 presidential election, the Republican Herbert Hoover decided to take it easy. He spent two months touring Latin America, a couple of weeks at home, and then went fly-fishing in Florida. He arrived in Washington, DC just two weeks before his inauguration.

Obama still has some 10 weeks before he takes office but the chances of today's President-elect donning waders and following Hoover's leisurely example are virtually zero.

The far larger and more activist presidency of today requires a period of intensive preparations. Obama's political capital will be at its height the day he takes office. To exploit this, he must "hit the ground running".

Obama's most pressing task is to select the 3,000 or so people who will form his administration. This number has swollen massively since Hoover's time and easily dwarfs the vacancies that face an incoming British Prime Minister.

Given the scale of this task, contingency planning well before the election is essential. An example studied closely by the Obama team is that of Pendleton James, a professional head-hunter, appointed by Ronald Reagan seven months before the November 1980 election. James discreetly compiled a large database of potential administration appointees, an invaluable resource after Reagan's victory.

According to Professor John Burke, an expert on presidential transitions at the University of Vermont, Obama's transition team has benefited from "a very well-developed and robust pre-election planning process". The first fruit has been a stream of early White House staff appointments, balancing loyalists from Chicago with experienced Washington operatives.

Here Obama learnt an important lesson from President Clinton. "I think our biggest shortcoming was not forming the White House staff soon enough", said Mark Gearan, deputy director of Clinton's transition team. Clinton's Chief of Staff was not named until the sixth week of the transition and many White House aides were appointed just days before the inauguration. With very little time to prepare for office, it was difficult for the Clinton team to gain traction on policy issues from day one.

With selection of the White House staff in hand, Obama has turned to his Cabinet. Here lies a prickly thicket of sensitive decisions. How should a President balance proven loyalty and raw talent in candidates for Cabinet posts?

In conversation with Arthur Schlesinger in 1960, President Kennedy leant heavily towards
the latter: "All I want to know is: Is he able? And will he go along with the program?" Obama, who is considering at least one Republican nominee, may share some of this philosophy. But this
is only the first rung on the Cabinet selection ladder.

Today a President is expected to produce a Cabinet that "looks like America", or at least represents the constituencies in the President-elect's winning coalition. Obama will need to reassure important voter blocs, including African Americans, Hispanics and women. Balancing these competing voices is a delicate task with obvious pitfalls.

"There are times when people who are competent are pushed aside because they are the wrong gender or colour", says Professor Stephen Hess, author of What do we do now? A Workbook for the President-elect. Broader representation and excellence in nominees are not necessarily conflicting aims, but careful management is essential.

There is one further Cabinet-related minefield for Obama to negotiate. While most White House staffers are simply appointed by the President, Cabinet positions (and many sub-Cabinet posts too) must be confirmed by a vote in the Senate. Senators take this constitutional prerogative very seriously.

While Cabinet officials commanding broad support can be confirmed quickly, sub-Cabinet level appointments take many months to complete. And the confirmation process is no rubber stamp. In early 1989, the newly- elected President George H W Bush used up valuable political capital in the fight to confirm John Tower as Secretary of Defence. Revelations from Tower's personal life undermined his candidacy, which never made it through the Senate. To avoid such pitfalls, transition teams must vet nominees thoroughly and float names informally with influential Senators in advance. Obama's vetting standards appear particularly vigorous. Hillary Clinton's nomination for Secretary of State may depend on Bill Clinton's business dealings standing up to scrutiny.

Second only to Obama's personnel choices will be the manner in which they are announced. The expectation is that Obama will name his Treasury Secretary early on, possibly as
part of a slew of financial appointments in a bid to reassure the markets. His nominee for Secretary of State will also likely come early, together with his national security team. Too great a delay in either of these key posts risks the appearance of vacillation, while also stunting policy development, a crucial activity for the new team.

If choosing the right people is paramount, understanding the machinery of government is also important. This requires close liaison with the outgoing administration, no matter what the ideological divide. Outgoing officials can be quite willing to pass on the benefits of their experience.

To ensure effective governance, Obama will need to embrace some continuity, whatever the rhetoric of change.

For Obama personally, the transition is a time of reinvention. As John Burke puts it, "the President-elect must reintroduce himself to the American public not only as a presidential candidate but as a President". His words now carry considerable weight.

At Bill Clinton's first press conference as President-elect, he casually reaffirmed his support for allowing gay people to serve openly in the military. These words were seized upon as a commitment to immediate change, not something Clinton had intended. As a consequence, this divisive issue distracted attention from Clinton's top priority, action on the economy. Obama's first press conference as President-elect offered no such hostages to fortune. He was short on specifics, but by and large struck a presidential tone.

While it's too early to judge the success of Obama's transition, the first signs are encouraging. Obama is a law professor by training and his analytical temperament is well suited to mastering the details of a successful transition.

Whether this intellectual mindset will serve him so well in the Oval Office, where Presidents must take immediate decisions on often imperfect information, remains to be seen.

Daniel Collings was a co-author of Anthony Seldon's acclaimed biography of Tony Blair and is now researching the official biography of Margaret Thatcher.