Two Stack Levels Up, Two Stack Levels Down

"I like two stack levels because it's like you should understand your boss's priorities and your boss's boss's priorities. Eventually, that means you have to know what the board is thinking." - Fareed Mosavat

What It Is

Two Stack Levels is a curiosity framework for understanding the full context of your work. It encourages you to build deep knowledge in four directions:

Two levels up: Your boss's priorities AND your boss's boss's priorities (strategic context)
Two levels down: The technical details that underpin your work (operational context)
Left and right: What adjacent teams are doing and how your work connects to theirs (horizontal context)

This breadth of understanding makes you the person others come to when they have questions about how things fit together. It builds trust with leadership and earns you sponsorship for bigger opportunities.

How It Works

Two Levels Up (Strategic)

Understand the strategic context above your immediate work:

What are your boss's top priorities?
What are your boss's boss's top priorities?
At senior levels: What is the board thinking about?
How does your work fit into the company's overall strategy?
What trade-offs is leadership making?

Two Levels Down (Operational)

Understand the technical and operational foundations:

How does the underlying system actually work?
What are the technical constraints?
For growth work: How does Stripe work? What are our dunning policies? How does the database structure affect what we can do?
For product work: What are the technical limitations? What would require major re-architecture?

Left and Right (Horizontal)

Understand the work happening adjacent to yours:

What are the core product teams working on that affects your work?
How does your work connect to marketing, sales, support?
Where are the dependencies and handoffs?
Who has information or customer conversations that could inform your work?

How to Apply It

Ask your manager directly: "What are your top priorities right now? What are the things your manager is most focused on?" This alone signals maturity and builds trust.
Build a mental model of the company: Think of the company as an equation or system of boxes. Understand how all the pieces fit together and where your work creates leverage.
Schedule curiosity conversations: Get coffee with people from adjacent teams. Ask what they're working on, what challenges they face, how your work affects theirs.
Go deep on technical foundations: Even if you're not technical, understand enough to have informed conversations about constraints and possibilities.
Be the expert people come to: When you understand how all the dots connect, you become the person others seek out when they have questions.

Why It Works

"I have found for me... that connecting the dots of how the whole company works and how all the pieces fit together has been one of the ways that I've driven that sponsorship."

People trust leaders who understand context. When you can speak intelligently about strategic priorities, technical constraints, and cross-functional dependencies, you demonstrate that you're ready for bigger scope.

This understanding also helps you:

Know when to escalate and when to decide yourself
Communicate what matters in ways that resonate with leadership
Anticipate how changes in one area will affect your work
Identify opportunities that others miss

When to Use It

When starting a new role
When seeking promotion to a leadership position
When feeling disconnected from the bigger picture
When wanting to build trust and earn sponsorship

Source

Guest: Fareed Mosavat
Episode: "How to build trust and grow as a product leader"
Key Discussion: (00:28:22) - Discussion of the stack levels concept
YouTube: Watch on YouTube

Related Frameworks

Optimize for Learning - Prioritize learning velocity
Sponsors and Advocates - Find people to champion your growth
Context Not Control - Share information liberally