Miles Matter More Than Years

I once got in an argument with a teacher about their teaching style. They said, “I’ve got 20 years teaching experiencing!” I said, “Repeating the same thing every year for 20 years isn’t 20 years experience, it’s one year of experience, which has become very outdated.” I was probably the most annoying little shit ever to teach, but I think I had a point.

People love to talk about experience like it’s a number. “Twenty years in the industry.” “Fifteen years of leadership.” It sounds impressive until you realise that most of those years were the same year repeated.

It’s not about how long you’ve been doing something. It’s about how hard you’ve driven.

I’ve met twenty-five-year-olds with more commercial experience than people twice their age. They’ve built things, broken things, failed publicly, recovered, and learned fast. Then there are others who’ve been in the game for decades and still operate like it’s their first day. Same ideas, same fears, same comfort zone.

That’s because time doesn’t automatically equal progress. What matters is the mileage — the choices, the hits, the rebuilds, the experiments. That’s where you find real depth.

Experience is earned through repetition and consequence. Every big decision, every risk, every problem you didn’t delegate adds to your mileage. Every time you push something further than you were comfortable with, you learn something most people never will.

The best leaders I’ve worked with aren’t necessarily the oldest. They’re the ones with scars. They’ve been through recessions, client disasters, bad hires, cashflow nightmares, and still found a way to keep going. They’ve taken punches, adjusted, and carried on. That’s experience.

So next time someone uses tenure as a badge of honour, look past the years. Ask what they’ve actually done. Ask what they’ve learned that cost them something. Ask what they’ve built, broken, or changed.

Miles beat years every time.

Stop counting time. Start counting impact.