on how increasingly automated yet complex systems make it more difficult to deal with problems that come up, focuses on airlines for the part I read

"Systems sufficiently complex enough to require deep vertical technical specialization risk complexity blindness. Each vertical team knows their component well but nobody understands the interactions of all the components. The two solutions are 1) well-defined and well-documented interfaces between components, be they hardware or software, and 2) and very experienced, highly-skilled engineer(s) on the team focusing on understanding inter-component interaction and overall system operation, especially in fault modes. Assigning this responsibility to a senior manager often isn’t sufficiently effective."

understanding this and following its immediate web could probably suck up a month or two of serious time: "Conklin identifies the following as defining characteristics of wicked problems: 1. The problem is not understood until after the formulation of a solution. 2. Wicked problems have no stopping rule. 3. Solutions to wicked problems are not right or wrong. 4. Every wicked problem is essentially novel and unique. 5. Every solution to a wicked problem is a 'one shot operation.' 6. Wicked problems have no given alternative solutions."

"...to solve complex technical problems does not demand deep technical competence, in fact that gets in the way. There is lots of deep technical competence around: thousands of highly skilled engineers who know messaging backwards and forwards, and who would enjoy working on something as juicy as AMQP....The way to solve complex problems is to make it easy for others to solve them. This is where competent engineers often fail: they understand technology but not people. Complexity is a human issue, and good design is about overcoming human limitations, not technical ones."

This is a great example of why you should be wary of ORMs. They can be very productive, but there's a lot of magic going on under the hood.

the point cannot be repeated enough: "The programmers of the previous generation felt secure that in order to make real software you had to understand all that they understood, which assured them a place at the top of the ladder, and made young dudes like me start out at the bottom. Heh. This is always a mistake. If you've created too complex a world, the next generation will just create a new one that's simpler. One that they understand and you don't. You're still at the top of a ladder -- your ladder. They just created a new one, and you're not even on it."

does this apply to software too? should it? "Why does anyone receive suboptimal care? After all, society could not have given us people with more talent, more dedication, and more training than the people in medical science have—than you have. I think the answer is that we have not grappled with the fact that the complexity of science has changed medicine fundamentally. This can no longer be a profession of craftsmen individually brewing plans for whatever patient comes through the door. We have to be more like engineers building a mechanism whose parts actually fit together, whose workings are ever more finely tuned and tweaked for ever better performance in providing aid and comfort to human beings. "

"Software is complex. Running unfamiliar programs can be frustrating. But if you condemn a program because it doesn't work just as you expect, you're being an asshole. "