diff --git a/RELEASE.md b/RELEASE.md
index 08e8cff7a..306b58412 100644
--- a/RELEASE.md
+++ b/RELEASE.md
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ have been merged since the last release have been labeled with the appropriate
 represent something that would make sense to our users. Some great information
 on why this is important can be found at
 [keepachangelog.com](https://keepachangelog.com/en/1.0.0/), but the overall
-guiding principles here is that changelogs are for humans, not machines.
+guiding principle here is that changelogs are for humans, not machines.
 
 When reviewing merged PR's the labels to be used are:
 
@@ -47,19 +47,21 @@ npm install --global release-it
 * Second, ensure that you have installed your projects dependencies:
 
 ```
-# using yarn
 yarn install
-
-# using npm
-npm install
 ```
 
-* And last (but not least 😁) do your release:
+* And last (but not least 😁) do your release. It requires a
+  [GitHub personal access token](https://github.com/settings/tokens) as
+  `$GITHUB_AUTH` environment variable. Only "repo" access is needed; no "admin"
+  or other scopes are required.
 
 ```
+export GITHUB_AUTH="f941e0..."
 release-it
 ```
 
 [release-it](https://github.com/release-it/release-it/) manages the actual
-release process. It will prompt you through the process of choosing the version
-number, tagging, pushing the tag and commits, etc.
+release process. It will prompt you to to choose the version number after which
+you will have the chance to hand tweak the changelog to be used (for the
+`CHANGELOG.md` and GitHub release), then `release-it` continues on to tagging,
+pushing the tag and commits, etc.
diff --git a/package.json b/package.json
index d4a19debd..57b50bc4c 100644
--- a/package.json
+++ b/package.json
@@ -106,14 +106,16 @@
     },
     "plugins": {
       "release-it-lerna-changelog": {
-        "infile": "CHANGELOG.md"
+        "infile": "CHANGELOG.md",
+        "launchEditor": true
       }
     },
     "git": {
       "tagName": "v${version}"
     },
     "github": {
-      "release": true
+      "release": true,
+      "tokenRef": "GITHUB_AUTH"
     }
   },
   "volta": {