Something that's hands-on requires direct interaction or participation. If you have hands-on coffee shop experience, it means you've actually made lattes and served scones with your own two hands.
When you take a hands-on sewing class, you'll actually cut and pin and sew fabric, and if a high school principal has a hands-on role, she might teach a class each semester. If it's a hands-on chemistry class, students will have the opportunity to mix chemicals and do experiments. Hands-on is a relatively new adjective, coined around 1969.