Attention to detail. It has become the default criterion for any coach who appears to be organised and ambitious. In Ireland it was Eddie O'Sullivan who first was accorded this status; then his successor, Declan Kidney, was slotted into the same category; and sure enough the incumbent, Joe Schmidt, is credited now with ploughing fields looking for unturned stones.

An example from his Leinster days, where he won four trophies in three seasons: after every game Schmidt would put in around five hours poring over the tape and storing away every scrap of information. The next morning the players would arrive for their medicals and recovery, and inevitably a couple would stray into his office wanting to rewind a moment from the contest. Always the response from the coach would be forensic. The players might not always like what they heard but they would leave knowing that every move they made was registered.

Tomorrow afternoon is Schmidt's first time on duty in England with his Ireland side. When he goes back there again it will be for the World Cup, which illustrates how little time he has to achieve his goal: a 30-man squad where everyone has the ability to start the big games. In Ireland's World Cup history that would be unique. He is expected to achieve it because he has brought quality to the operation at just the right point in the journey. As he did with Leinster.

"His timing was really good to be fair," says Jono Gibbes, the forwards coach with Leinster. "Michael Cheika's job had been really to put a spine into Leinster and he established that well. So the group had moved on from needing a spine to needing something more, and Joe arrived with good, clear – not simple – messages that had purpose. He gave it focus, and that's how he won the players over – not by impressing them with anything in particular other than well-thought-out rugby.

"And I think he benefited from the fact that he didn't have to spend time motivating them to play for Leinster, getting them to 'show up' at Dragons away – the things that Cheiks had fought for in his time. Joe was able to channel his strengths into getting the group clear and focused on how we wanted to play the game."

And that was with minutiae in bold, capital letters. It was always interesting to watch Leinster train because Lions, grand slam winners and Heineken Cup champions were constantly being pulled up on getting wrong, by a matter of a few degrees, their entry to a breakdown, or the angle of a support run, or the placement of a pass. There were not many toys being thrown out of prams either.

"I think his experience of being a school principal stood to him, directing 1,400 students – all that sort of stuff," Gibbes says. "That really armed him with good skills so he didn't have to manage egos. The message was clear and he didn't invite too much opinion."

Schmidt was a skinny winger for Manawatu before his coaching career started at a school in Palmerston North on New Zealand's North Island. He was ahead of the game in the planning he brought to the operation.

That led him to New Zealand schools, and then into the professional game where he hooked up with Vern Cotter. At the time Gibbes was playing for Waikato and Schmidt was assisting Cotter with Bay of Plenty, both provinces feeding the Chiefs franchise though from different points on the food chain.

"There were some real grudge matches there," Gibbes says. "There was a real sense that Waikato had been a bit entitled in the Chiefs region and the Bay were sort of second class. But with him and Vern they turned the Bay into something pretty awesome I thought."

The next time they got together would be in Clermont, after Schmidt had spent three seasons as assistant with the Auckland Blues. The set-up in France appealed to him: a blue-collar town with a desperate need to secure the national title that had eluded them through their history. The Top 14 finals of 2009 and 2010 went the same way as the previous eight: south. Schmidt's last game in the Auvergne was the final of 2010. They won, and he left for Dublin with the reassurance that the right methods applied consistently would set you free.

And that's how Leinster played. At least it looked that way. In reality there was a lot of choreography, and the off-the-cuff stuff worked only because the team had the skills to carry it off.

All of which was a far remove from his first four games – three of which were defeats – in charge, after which one unfortunate pundit declared Schmidt had lost the dressing room. A delegation of senior players assured him the next morning that they did not need finding. Leinster would crown that season by beating Saints with a remarkable second-half comeback in the Heineken Cup final in Cardiff.

The only way Schmidt could avoid the Ireland job was by leaving the country. Staying was easy, for his family were well settled in Dublin. Moreover the national job would afford him more time at home where his son Luke suffers from epilepsy.

Schmidt has campaigned on behalf of epilepsy sufferers in Ireland. This has added something to his image as a decent human being. He has generated overwhelmingly positive comment from all quarters since arriving in the summer of 2010, which is unique in this business. It goes a bit further than dotting Is and crossing Ts.