After creating a new folder, or making any Finder change name action for that matter, hit the Enter key (not the return) key and the Finder will immediately allow you to enter a suitable name. No repeat clicking or selecting are necessary anymore; just hit Enter and change the name (with thanks to Wiebe Hoogeveen for this HINT).
[robg adds: This one took me a bit of time to figure out, as I wasn't experiencing the same thing on my machine. It turns out that this is an odd quirk with list view only; icon view, column view, and the desktop (being an icon view) all work fine when you just start typing after creating the folder. Since I seldom use list view, my preliminary testing didn't show the problem. Also, on my machines, both Enter and Return work to allow instant name changes; I'm not sure why the author's Return key doesn't work as mine does. A very similar but later hint submission by nunz provided the crucial bit of info on list view -- thanks!]
Mac OS X Hints
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20030325194656598