Looking for Root Causes Is a False Path

Michael Stiefel chats with David Blank-Edelman about how SRE and architecture feed each other: real-world reliability (like latency or durability) only emerges from how a system actually behaves in production, so hunting for a single “root cause” often misses the bigger picture. Instead, teams should study what went right, embrace curiosity about system failures and successes, and use that feedback loop to build systems that evolve, degrade gracefully, and retire cleanly.

Reliability isn’t a checkbox you flip on—it’s an emergent property shaped by design, operations, and real-time feedback. By breaking down silos between architects and SREs, you get the insights needed to learn from mishaps, iterate faster, and craft more resilient systems overall.

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