An important machine in a factory stops working. No matter what they do they can't get it to work again.

So they bring in a specialist to solve the problem, for an agreed fee of $1000

The guy checks the machine over and then goes and presses a specific button and the machine is back working again.

So the factory manager goes: "All you did was press a button! Why should I pay you $1000 for pressing a button?!"

To which the specialist answers: "Well, you see, you're paying me just $1 to press the button. The other $999 are for knowing which button to press".

[–] [email protected] 56 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I heard the same story when I was a kid, but it was about a boilermaker. The rest was for knowing where to tap his hammer to fix their problem.

It's an obviously apocryphal story with two great messages. First, don't undervalue your expertise just because the fix was easy (I still have a problem with that). Second, if you don't know what you're doing don't question the expert just because it looked easy.

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