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When Michaela McGuire was hired by a federal MP eight months before the 2007 election, she didn't know exactly what to expect. She probably should have, because before that she had worked in the highrollers' room of a casino and had overseen lap dances in a strip club. It would become another novelty job to add to her brief but colourful résumé.

Michaela has advised a Liberal MP to campaign for his seat rather than get a haircut, cleaned ashtrays and helped organise a senior partner's stamp collection at a prestigious law firm. Whatever the contributing factors to her brilliant career, foresight was not one of them.