Provisioning Self-Service
Teams obtaining infrastructure without a ticket, within bounds that make the request safe by construction rather than by review.
The ticket exists to apply judgement: is this sized sensibly, is it tagged, is it in the right network, does it comply. Self-service works by encoding that judgement into the request path so the judgement is applied automatically and instantly.
Concretely: the team declares intent at a level above raw resources — "a PostgreSQL database for service X, production, medium" — and the platform expands that into a configuration that is already tagged for cost allocation, already in the right subnet, already encrypted with the right key, already backed up, already sized within a permitted range. The things a reviewer would have checked are not checked; they are unavailable to get wrong.
The residual review is for what falls outside the bounds, and that residue should be small and should shrink. If most requests need an exception, the bounds are wrong. The related trap is offering self-service creation without self-service destruction and cost visibility, which produces an estate that grows monotonically and an unpleasant conversation with finance.