Which is perfectly fine, and I find that somewhat gratifying as well, but if the work involved amounted to wishing it into existence, than I may as well take a helicopter to the top of a mountain instead of climbing it. It's not not fun, but it's there's no meaningful process involved, and I'd be cool doing that only once in a while. Granted the processes you describe, and I've also experienced, are horribly bureaucratic and unsatisfying as well, but those do seem like a false dichotomy; either you're involved in the mechanics of the work and have tons of bureaucracy or you're not involved at all and have none. More than likely, process always accumulates to bureaucracy, but there are sweet spots that I hope stick around.