Southwest Airlines is changing its checked-bags policy. That's technically an article about air travel, but it doubles as a lesson in complex systems and risk management.

The core idea behind complexity is interconnectedness. Changes do not exist in isolation; they ripple out and impact other elements of the system.

In Southwest's case, charging for checked bags doesn't just impact revenue. It also impacts passengers' decision-making and airport operations, both of which contribute to check-in, boarding, and ultimately, departure time.

It looks like Southwest did their homework – the article goes into detail on the various tech- and data-driven tools they've implemented to smooth the transition to paid bags.

The take-away lesson: when making a change to your business, you'd do well to map out the knock-on effects (perform risk assessment) and proactively improve your ability to handle them (implement risk mitigation).