In response to "There is no pride in managing or understanding complexity.", I posit the following based on my experience:
Understanding and managing complexity is one of the first steps required in order to eliminate complexity. Some of the greatest achievements in my software development career have been instances where I carefully pulled apart inscruitable solutions, often short-term and built in desperation, and re-constituted them into well tested and much less complex solutions which were more understandable by devs and users.
I agree with most of Chris' observations and enjoyed reading his insights. Makes me want to do the same!