GitHub engineers have faced significant challenges with database schema migrations due to the fast-paced development and frequent changes required for new features, which often involve complex alterations to MySQL databases. Initially, schema changes at GitHub were managed manually, consuming considerable time from the database infrastructure team. To streamline this, they developed tools and processes such as GitHub Actions and skeema to automate schema management, allowing schema design to be treated as code and integrated into the GitHub flow. GitHub's approach emphasizes the use of pull requests for schema changes, leveraging skeema for generating SQL transitions and skeefree for orchestrating migrations across production environments. This system allows developers to maintain control over changes while ensuring that database infrastructure teams can efficiently manage and prioritize schema migrations. Despite GitHub's unique internal setup, they have open-sourced some of their tools, though these require adaptation to be used in different environments.