I was thinking of this story today and wanted to post it for everyones reading pleasure. It will make a lot of sense to the "gurus" in a software team. :)
One day in a large factory with a long assembly line a critical machine suddenly stopped working. This brought the entire assembly line to a halt and partially finished products were backed up all through the factory. The company that owned the factory was in a panic as they were losing thousands of dollars for every hour that the factory was shut down.
The chief mechanic was called in and he insisted that there was only one expert who he knew could correct the problem quickly so the expert was called in. When the expert arrived, he was a modest looking man in common work clothes carrying a small toolbox. He examined the halted machine for about ten minutes then removed a hammer from his toolbox. He struck the machine once with the hammer and suddenly the machine started running at full capacity. Goods started moving smoothly down the assembly line at full rate and the factory was back online.
The expert then presented the chief mechanic with a bill for $5000. “This is outrageous!” the mechanic exclaimed “5000 dollars to hit a machine with a hammer?” The expert replied “Oh, let me itemize that bill for you.” and presented the chief mechanic with the following itemized invoice:
- Hitting machine with hammer ….…………$5.00
- Knowing where to hit machine ….…$4995.00
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