Twilio's product engineering teams were struggling with manual MySQL cluster deployments, which consumed too much time and were prone to errors. To address this issue, Twilio developed a tool called pivotd that automates the process of provisioning and managing database clusters. The tool leverages existing architecture such as deployment convergence engines and adds new steps for work, chaining them in a dependency tree. Users fill out a declarative form with information about their cluster, which is validated to prevent user errors or unsafe behavior, and the automated system takes care of the rest. This results in pivoting a database becoming as simple as deploying a stateless service, saving time and preventing engineers from making costly mistakes. The tool has allowed Twilio's developers to deliver new software swiftly and reliably, outpacing the increasing number of engineers at the company.