Sonja Hood opened the door of her bayside home at about 8.30pm on Thursday night, and in strolled Alastair Clarkson and his manager James Henderson.

The North Melbourne president knew why they were there, but just as a coach never celebrates victory until the final siren, she wasn't prepared to celebrate just yet.

That moment came soon after. Clarkson started talking. Hood can't remember the exact words, but she knew what they meant: he would be accepting a five-season offer to coach the Kangaroos.

A bottle of pinot noir was opened, and for the next two and a half hours, they sipped and talked about a North Melbourne past, current and future.

The audacious Get Clarko Project had been completed, five weeks to the night after it officially started – back in a Hobart bar on July 21 when Hood and Henderson secretly met two days before North Melbourne's round 19 match against Hawthorn at Blundstone Arena.

"No one knew about that catch-up, thankfully no one saw us, we had a drink and discussed where Clarko was at and where we were at as a club," Hood told AFL.com.au.

"I'd sketched out an approach, and maybe an advantage I had was that I had never done this before. I had no pre-supposed idea of how I needed to do it."

Two days after that wine in a Hobart bar, Hood and Henderson were in the Blundstone Oval function room, as North played Hawthorn. They spoke again for 10 minutes at half-time, this time maybe deliberately in eyesight of others. They arranged further catch-ups.

Landing Clarkson, officially announced on Friday morning, was a massive North Melbourne event. But it actually wasn't Hood’s first momentous, history-shaping North Melbourne moment.

Back in 2007, Hood was a key figure in the club's fight against AFL headquarters in an ugly battle to move it to the Gold Coast. Back then, she was a mere devoted supporter. She powerfully galvanised fellow devoted supporters, and devised a simple, beautifully effective slogan: Keep North South.
 
It proved a key weapon in the club's ability to fight off AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou, who was adamant the club needed to relocate.

 James Brayshaw took control of North Melbourne at this time, drawing on the power of Hood's campaign, and led it for nine seasons. Brayshaw, too, somehow fought off AFL headquarters and even more incredibly dragged North back to financial stability.

He also played a role in the courting of Clarkson in recent weeks, speaking with him on several occasions. He never demanded he re-join the club at which he began his playing career in 1987, but at the same time mounted a compelling case that there was no better place for him to be from 2023 onwards.

Fifteen years after her Keep North South campaign, and just months after taking over the club's presidency, Hood has delivered one of the all-time great coaching coups.

Time will tell, but it may be as big as North Melbourne's poaching of the iconic Ron Barassi for the 1973 season.

"At the risk of sounding completely disingenuous, I feel incredibly blessed to have had the opportunity to have such an impact on something I really love. I truly do, and we are not done here by a long shot," Hood said.

"Clarkson is a fantastic get, but there is a lot of work to do to get the club back to where it needs to be. And it's interesting, because when people say 'back', I don't think of it as 'back'. I think of it as getting it to where it needs to be, because it has experienced on-field success, but it has never really experienced off-field stability.

"To me, the KPI (key performance indicator), apart from winning a flag, is that we move beyond just being existential over the next stretch. It has to be unimaginable to people that North doesn't exist in Victoria. And that will be what success looks like.

"That is the journey. Alastair is important. So is Arden (redevelopment). That is phenomenal. The future fund. It is all really important to us."

Hood's decision to deal exclusively with four-time premiership coach Clarkson had left her comfortable upon entering round 22 of the season. But a curveball to her plans came in Essendon's decision to change presidents on that weekend, and then belatedly go all-out for Clarkson.

While that Bombers project ended in disaster, with Clarkson barely giving it a moment's thought, and with it also leaving Essendon even more fractured than it already was with players angrily challenging David Barham, the man who rolled Paul Brasher as part of his own Get Clarkson Project, it nevertheless prompted massive apprehension in Hood and other North officials.

"I did get worried, and I got worried because it wasn't something I had contemplated," she said.

"You know that feeling when you've got a plan, and when something comes from left-field and you haven't prepared for it or planned for it."

Initially, Hood felt she would need to engage in a bidding war. Instead, a calm descended. She called a board meeting.

"We decided to just see it how it plays out," Hood said. "James (Henderson) had been incredibly open and honest all the way through, and everyone tells you what you can and can't trust and what you can and can't listen to, and my instinct was he was being straight.

"He (Henderson) would never gild the lily. If there was something to worry about, he would tell me there was something to worry about. He was just straight. He guaranteed me if there was going to be a problem, he would let me know."

While Hood was North's main weapon in the Clarkson approach, she said it was an all-club strategy.

"It was never about just me. I was incredibly supported by the club, and as much as there was pressure on the outcome, people honestly felt the club had carried itself well," Hood said.

"And I honestly felt people would judge us on our intentions, not necessarily the outcome. I realise I can say that now, because of the outcome. But people were with us on the journey."

In her non-paid job, Hood re-connected Clarkson with the North Melbourne Football Club.

In her paid profession, she is CEO of Community Hubs Australia, where she oversees the engagement of refugee and migrant women and pre-school children into schooling, education and community connection.

"I run a network of community hubs and what I do is connect people, and people and money, and I'm on a quest for world domination, one hub at time ... I run a national, not-for-profit network, and I draw money out of government and corporates," she said.

"And it's not that different to footy, really, because it is all about connections."