That still requires admin time to update the configuration and change management tools, QA time to run a regression test that will exercise all the potential failure paths, development time if you count on the ability to do configuration updates based on application state, etc. Updates that look small can still require considerable changes.
If you're used to it, you can streamline these processes and automate as much as possible. Even if it's a change you can't easily test or automate, by making just the one change at a time you know what to blame if it breaks. :)
