I heard it said a while ago that there are only three jobs in consulting:

• Grinders: those who do the work
• Minders: those who make sure the work gets done
• Finders: those who find new work

I like this because it rhymes. But also because it's a good model for how lots of old-school business operates: sales running things [1], bossing a bunch of stressed-out middle managers, who oversee an army of labor doing the work. I just watched Narcos; the description above pretty accurately describes the drug cartels of that show. (It's not how R&D-intensive companies operate; I'll revisit this point later.)

In order to be great at your job, you need to understand what's going on above you. But how can you understand a job you've never done?

People from powerful families have a huge leg up here; they can ask their parents or relatives. Friends usually can't help because they tend to be about the same age and level of experience.

Living in a good neighborhood could help. It would be pretty nuts living next door to the CEO of a Fortune 500 company; that would be like getting an MBA one casual encounter at a time.

Right now, I have the bizarre luxury of doing all of these roles at once: I write code for Interval, my scheduling product, I manage people for shortbar, my consulting company, and I'm on the executive board of my HOA. Each has its challenges. But I believe doing each makes me better at the others.

One underappreciated hack to get experience above your level: volunteering. You can do things for free you have no business doing, and people will let you, just because you're a "volunteer". This feels like some sort of cheat code for life.

[1] I love Sam Altman's tweet: "Most careers turn into sales jobs when you get senior enough". I realized this a while ago, but never articulated it that well.