Let's be blunt: if you're delivering production software through GitHub and still using GitHub Teams, you're flying blind.
You might feel secure because you've enabled CODEOWNERS
and branch protections. Maybe you require reviews and limit who can push to main
. But those controls were standard ten years ago. GitHub's threat surface has evolved. And most teams haven't caught up.
If you're using GitHub Actions, managing secrets, or allowing contractors to push code, you are exposed in ways your current governance cannot prevent.
And here's the hard truth: we waited longer than we should have to upgrade. After switching to GitHub Enterprise, we realized just how much we were leaving up to chance.
Let's walk through what you're risking, and why GitHub Enterprise isn't just for FAANG—it's for any team serious about software delivery.
GitHub is no longer just source control. It's:
That makes it:
So if GitHub is compromised—or even just misused—your prod environment is at risk.
Here's the trajectory most teams follow:
CODEOWNERS
and branch protections to ensure no one can commit directly to main
. Good.The reality is:
All without creating a pull request. No review. Limited audit trail.
There is no way to scope repository secrets. They behave like shared team secrets, with no protections beyond repository write access.
And that's the point: GitHub Teams assumes a single team with mutual trust. As soon as you move beyond that model, you need GitHub Enterprise.
Once you understand that, the rest falls into place.
Foundational controls like CODEOWNERS
and branch protections are a great start—but they aren't enough for modern delivery.
Let's look at what's possible in GitHub Teams:
So a bad actor or even a careless dev could:
You now have a supply chain compromise, and no branch protections or PR reviews can catch it.
GitHub Enterprise gives you:
And, critically:
If you're using org secrets today, we'll say it plainly: those are barely secrets. Every repo that uses them exposes them.
With GitHub Enterprise, you can retire that risk.
Let's say you're a small startup. Why should you care?
Because you:
All it takes is one compromised token, one malicious branch, one mistake with a tag.
And unlike the big guys, you don't have an incident response team to catch it.
GitHub Enterprise gives you:
It's the kind of maturity that makes auditors and customers feel good about working with you.
At Cloud Posse, we use GitHub heavily:
And for too long, we stayed on GitHub Teams.
We had protections. We had good hygiene. We thought we knew our risks.
But it wasn't until we moved to GitHub Enterprise that we realized:
We had been trusting too much and governing too little.
Now we have real deployment approvals. Protected tags. Environment and branch scoped secrets. Org-wide policy enforcement with rulesets. We sleep better. We move faster.
If you're hesitating because of the cost or complexity, we get it. But the truth is:
You're already betting your company on GitHub. You should govern it like it matters.
GitHub Enterprise isn't as expensive as most people assume—especially when compared to other tools in your stack.
In fact, you're probably already spending more on: ChatGPT, Cursor, Slack, Salesforce, HubSpot, and Cloud IDEs.
And none of those tools are how your software gets shipped.
GitHub Teams supports environments, but doesn't support environment-scoped secrets or protected tags. The governance features that matter—the ones that secure your production delivery—are in GitHub Enterprise.
GitHub is your delivery platform. It governs what code gets built, tested, reviewed, and deployed.
Why wouldn't you harden that?
GitHub Enterprise isn't just for big tech.
It's for:
If GitHub is how you deliver change, then GitHub Enterprise is how you govern it.
Talk to an engineer. We'll help you figure out what protections you actually need—and what you can stop worrying about once you have them.