Ben Balter — Technology leadership, collaboration, and open source

Popular Posts

Why everything should have a URL

15 min read

When knowledge lives in people's heads and inboxes, it doesn't scale. Giving decisions and processes URLs makes context discoverable, asynchronous, and opt-in.

Why you should work asynchronously

7 min read

Async is what makes remote work actually work. It produces better outcomes, improves work-life balance, and unlocks flow—by evolving beyond Cold War-era workflows.

Why open source

18 min read

Open source isn't a fad—it's how modern organizations build software. Here are twenty-five economic, moral, and personal reasons your organization should embrace it.

Leaders show their work

12 min read

Great leaders don't just communicate what decision was made—they explain how and why. Without that context, every top-down decision sounds like "because I said so."

Manage like an engineer

10 min read

If issues, pull requests, and project boards are the best way to develop software, should they not also be the best way to manage software development?

Cathedral vs Bazaar People Management

5 min read

What if we applied open source's most famous metaphor to people management? Cathedral managers control and direct; bazaar managers empower and facilitate. Knowing which style fits your team matters.

Recent Posts

Agentic workflows and the future of software development

10 min read

AI agents that write code, open pull requests, and fix bugs aren't replacing developers — they're extending the same patterns of transparency, code review, and collaboration that have made open source successful for decades.

How to run LanguageTool on macOS

6 min read

How to set up LanguageTool, a free and open-source grammar checker, to run locally on your Mac so nothing you type ever leaves your computer. No Grammarly subscription required.

Older Posts

Cathedral vs Bazaar People Management

5 min read

What if we applied open source's most famous metaphor to people management? Cathedral managers control and direct; bazaar managers empower and facilitate. Knowing which style fits your team matters.

How to communicate like a GitHub engineer

1 min read

Learn more about how we use GitHub to build GitHub, how we turned our guiding communications principles into prescriptive practices to manage our internal communications signal-to-noise ratio, and how you can contribute to the ongoing conversation.

Pull requests are a form of documentation

3 min read

Pull requests capture not just what changed, but who, why, and what alternatives were considered. Treat every PR as a time capsule for future contributors.

Practice inclusive scheduling

2 min read

Small scheduling choices — like writing dates unambiguously, including time zones, and building in breaks — go a long way toward making distributed teams feel inclusive.

Intro to GitHub for non-technical roles

10 min read

GitHub isn't just for developers. If you're in a non-technical role, this guide covers everything you need to follow along, collaborate, track work, and get started with confidence.

How to write a great extended leave document

6 min read

A battle-tested template for handing off your responsibilities before extended leave, so your team stays unblocked and nothing falls through the cracks.

Manage like an engineer

10 min read

If issues, pull requests, and project boards are the best way to develop software, should they not also be the best way to manage software development?

Helpful 404s for Jekyll (and GitHub Pages)

3 min read

How to build 404 pages for Jekyll and GitHub Pages that automatically suggest similar URLs to the one requested, using Levenshtein distance and your sitemap.

Why you should work asynchronously

7 min read

Async is what makes remote work actually work. It produces better outcomes, improves work-life balance, and unlocks flow—by evolving beyond Cold War-era workflows.

The seven things a corporate Chief of Staff does

14 min read

The Chief of Staff role is poorly understood and hard to define. Here are the seven core responsibilities, from tactical office management to strategic advising, that make the role indispensable.

Leaders show their work

12 min read

Great leaders don't just communicate what decision was made—they explain how and why. Without that context, every top-down decision sounds like "because I said so."

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