A: Where do you think you cut your teeth for this job, Lee?

B: I cut my media teeth at university.

A: Wow, no wonder you look so sophisticated when interviewing people.

Note: When a baby’s teeth first appear, what is really cut is the gums as the teeth push through them. The Oxford English Dictionary gives “cut” in this sense, with “tooth” or “teeth” as the object, in quotations going back to 1677. Now this idiom refers to someone gaining experience with something, especially at a young age (when one’s teeth would be coming in).