Anything that isn't within a couple of levels of your own role is basically 'less visible'. That's sort of the point, it's about abstracting - divison of labour

Anything that isn't within a couple of levels of your own role is basically 'less visible'. That's sort of the point, it's about abstracting - divison of labour etc. So you can't really see the work that someone two levels above you is doing. Likewise for the same reason people higher in the org struggle to get information on people a few levels down are doing. The basic answer is that operational roles are focused on the current phase of work. Middle level roles are focused on co-ordination. Higher level roles are focused on future phases of work (and managing external stakeholders). For many of the senior roles the reasons the work is less visible is because it's either in situations employees aren't, or considered confidential. For example, CEO meeting with investors is a big chunk of work, but it's not that visible to employees. For an example of the second, I'd say 'organisational design' and areas of investment are often confidential as they have implications for hiring/firing.