“I hardly recognize any of these people,” a long-standing Conservative activist said to me as we stood surveying the room at a party for Kevin O’Leary at a downtown Ottawa bar.

She meant it as the biggest of compliments.

The event took place Thursday on the first night of the Manning Centre Conference, the biggest annual non-party gathering of Conservatives in the country.

At this year’s conference, the stakes are high. It’s taking place three months before the party selects its second ever leader.

The impressions made here are what will set the tone from now until then. And the undeniable impression so far is that O’Leary generates real excitement.

While the conference draws hundreds of people from across the country, it’s often the usual suspects. If you’re in a packed bar, everywhere you turn there’ll be familiar faces.

And while there were still many regulars who came out eager to see what O’Leary had to say, there were also, to the activist’s point, quite a lot of fresh blood.

This is what the party wants, what any party wants. It’s what Justin Trudeau and his team pulled off in between his leadership bid in 2013 and his massive 2015 electoral victory.

When O’Leary arrived, the crowd erupted in cheers, people thronged towards him, and before he could get 10 feet into the place, he was surrounded by selfie seekers.

The other candidates don’t generate anywhere near this type of hype. They have to work the room. But with O’Leary, the room works him.

There are lot of legitimate concerns about the well-known businessman. His previous comments about wanting to pull us out of the ISIS mission and stating “there is nothing proud about being a warrior” are alarming at a time when the global terror threat is very real.

The last time I interviewed him, on my radio show, he refused to confirm that he’d step away from Shark Tank and his various other endeavours should he win this race. And it’s clear that even after he officially announced, he’s still spending a lot of time outside of the country. Does he think being leader of the official opposition is just another high-profile part-time gig to take on?

Perhaps the biggest issue, though, is that aside from his “jobs, jobs, jobs” mantra, he’s offered little indication of what his overarching message and political philosophy will be. Quite a few people question, with good reason, if he’s even actually a conservative.

All of this aside, the O’Leary factor is real. Winning policies can be brought in, devised, shuffled in and out. The one thing that can’t be faked or made up on the fly, though, is that most important quality of all: Leadership.

Most of the people running for leader are smart and talented individuals, but they’re not natural leaders. You know soon after they open their mouths that, bright as they may be, they can’t rally the troops.

The key thing I’ve been hearing from readers and party members alike is that they like O’Leary because he’s not afraid to say what’s on his mind and doesn’t twist himself into politically correct knots.

As I reported the other week, an authoritative Edelman survey reveals that Canadian sentiment has many of the pre-Brexit, pre-Trump ingredients that the U.K. and U.S. had before anti-establishment voices triumphed at the polls.

The political climate is changing, there’s no doubt about that, and O’Leary stands to benefit.

afurey@postmedia.com