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Approval Patterns

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Overview

Release approval is the final decision before production deployment: "Is this code ready for production?"

The CD Model supports two approaches:

Pattern Who Decides When Timeline
Release Approval (RA) Human (release manager) Stage 9 hours up to 1-2 weeks
Continuous Deployment (CDe) Automation Stage 9 (human approved at Stage 3) minutes up to 2-4 hours

Both patterns validate the same quality criteria - they differ in who decides and when.

RA Pattern: Manual Approval

How It Works

Two-level approval:

  1. Stage 3 (Merge Request): Peer reviewer approves code quality
  2. Stage 9 (Release Approval): Release manager approves production deployment

Flow:

Code merged (Stage 3) → Build/Test (4-6) → Exploration (7) →
Release candidate (8) → MANUAL APPROVAL (9) → Production (10)

Release Manager Role

Responsibilities:

  • Review quality metrics (tests, coverage, security)
  • Review documentation (release notes, runbooks)
  • Assess business risk and timing
  • Make go/no-go decision
  • Coordinate with stakeholders

Decision options:

  • Approve: Proceed to production
  • Reject: Fix issues, return to earlier stage
  • Defer: Quality acceptable, but timing is bad

When to Use RA Pattern

  • Regulated industries (finance, healthcare, government)
  • High-risk systems (critical infrastructure)
  • Large coordinated releases
  • Organizations requiring formal approval
  • Teams building deployment maturity

CDe Pattern: Automated Approval

How It Works

Single approval point:

  1. Stage 3 (Merge Request): Peer reviewer approves for production (combined approval)
  2. Stage 9: Automated gate verifies objective criteria

Flow:

Code merged for PRODUCTION (Stage 3) → Build/Test (4-6) →
Release candidate (8) → AUTO-APPROVE (9) → Production (10)

Shift-Left Approval

The key difference: approval happens at Stage 3, not Stage 9.

When a peer reviewer approves in CDe, they're saying:

  • Code quality is good
  • Tests are adequate
  • Ready for production deployment

Stage 9 becomes verification (did we meet criteria?) not decision (should we deploy?).

Requirements for CDe

Requirement Why
Robust automated testing No human gate means tests must catch issues
Feature flags Decouple deployment from release
Comprehensive monitoring Detect issues in production fast
Automated rollback Recover without human intervention
Team trust in automation Cultural readiness

When to Use CDe Pattern

  • Fast-moving SaaS products
  • Non-regulated industries
  • Strong automated testing culture
  • Feature flag infrastructure in place
  • Independent services (microservices)

Choosing Between Patterns

Decision Framework

Question RA Pattern CDe Pattern
Regulated industry? Yes No
Robust automated testing (≥80% coverage)? Optional Required
Feature flags in place? Optional Required
Desired deployment frequency? Weekly/monthly Multiple per day
Risk tolerance? Low (prefer human oversight) High (trust automation)

Pattern Comparison

Factor RA Pattern CDe Pattern
Approval Manual (release manager) Automated (objective criteria)
Timeline 1-2 weeks 2-4 hours
Stage 3 approves Code quality only Code quality + production
Stage 9 Human decision Automated verification
Release timing Business-driven Continuous
Feature flags Optional Required
Risk mitigation Human judgment Automation + flags

Objective vs Subjective Criteria

Objective (automatable):

  • Test pass rate: 100%
  • Code coverage: ≥80%
  • Critical bugs: 0
  • Performance regression: <5%
  • Security vulnerabilities: 0 critical/high

Subjective (requires human judgment):

  • Business timing: Is now a good time?
  • Risk assessment: What's the business impact?
  • Stakeholder readiness: Are teams prepared?

RA pattern: Uses both objective and subjective criteria

CDe pattern: Only objective criteria (subjective handled at Stage 3 or via feature flags)

Next Steps

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