JOKE OF THE DAY: The Manager and the Potatoes

A high-level manager at a major company recently faced a big health scare. After having a heart attack, his doctor gave him some very strict advice: he needed to leave the city and spend several weeks relaxing on a quiet farm. The manager didn’t want to go at first, but he finally “reluctantly agreed” and headed out to the countryside.

Once he arrived, he was met with a world he wasn’t used to. He was “surrounded by fields, fresh air, and… silence.” For a man who spent his life in a “fast-paced office environment full of deadlines, phone calls, and coffee-fueled meetings,” the quiet was overwhelming. After only two days, he was “bored out of his mind.” He missed the excitement of his old life and couldn’t handle the “slow rhythm of farm life anymore.”

Finding Work on the Farm

Desperate for something to do, he approached the farmer and asked for a chore. The farmer decided to give him a dirty job, thinking it would take a long time. He told him to clean the cow manure out of the barn. To the farmer’s surprise, the manager finished the whole thing in less than a day.

When the farmer praised him, the manager just “grinned” and said, “I’ve managed bigger messes in the office.”

The next day, the farmer gave him an even tougher task: 500 chickens needed to be prepared for market. This was a messy and difficult job. However, by the time evening rolled around, the manager had finished every single one. He explained his success by saying, “In my line of work, I’ve had to make tough decisions and cut off heads metaphorically for years. Doing it literally wasn’t much different.”

The Challenge of the Potatoes

The farmer was shocked by how “efficient” the city man was. For the third day, he picked a task that seemed the easiest of all. He handed the manager a large bag of potatoes and two boxes. He told him to put the big potatoes in one box and the small ones in the other.

“Got it. Easy enough,” the manager said.

But when the farmer returned at sunset, he was stunned. The manager hadn’t moved. The boxes were empty, and the manager looked “utterly exhausted.” He hadn’t sorted a single potato!

The manager looked at the farmer and said, “You don’t understand. This job requires making decisions — and I’ve spent my whole life trying to avoid those!”

A New Way of Thinking

The farmer couldn’t help but laugh. He joked that it was funny how a man could handle blood and chaos but was “afraid to pick a potato.” The manager realized that in the corporate world, he hid behind meetings and memos. He said, “In my office, I just send out memos and let someone else decide. Out here, every potato feels like a performance review.”

That night, the manager stayed awake thinking. He realized he had lost the ability to make simple choices. The next morning, he finally sorted the bag. When the farmer asked what changed, the manager simply said, “I realized not every decision needs a meeting.”

The Manager’s Simple Harvest

During his stay, the manager learned many things. He even learned how to make a simple, healthy snack using the very potatoes he had sorted. Here is a simple recipe he enjoyed:

Returning to the City

When his vacation ended, the manager was a different person. He was “calmer, kinder, and even — surprisingly — happier.” He stopped trying to control every little thing and started trusting his employees to make their own choices.

When his assistant asked why he seemed so different, he just laughed and said, “Potatoes.” He told her that those vegetables “taught me more about life than any MBA program ever did.”

The lesson is simple: You can lead a giant company, but if you can’t make the small choices in life, you might need to slow down. True wisdom often comes from “dirt under your nails” and the courage to “just choose.”