The person with the most mechanical knowledge is usually the person who is running the machine, but this boss didn't seem to think so. What led to this mess was the fact that this same boss refused to do regular maintenance on the (expensive) machine, so it began breaking down, as expected. An employee tentatively approached him, explaining that the company was going to lose a lot of money if they didn't shut it off in order to fix it. This advice fell on deaf ears.