Refactoring at Scale

Chapter 6. Building the Right Team

Ocean’s 11 is one of those heist films that shows up on everyone’s list of favorites. It starts off with Danny Ocean getting released from prison. He meets up with his partner in crime and friend Rusty Ryan to propose a heist. The plan is to steal $150,000,000 from three Las Vegas casinos: the Bellagio, the Mirage, and the MGM Grand. The two thieves know they can’t pull off the heist alone, so they start gathering a crew of criminals, including a former casino owner, a pickpocket, a con man, an electronics and surveillance expert, an explosives professional, and an acrobat.

The team splits up into two groups: the first group gets to know the ins and outs of the Bellagio, learning the routines of the staff and gathering details on how the casino operates; the second group builds a replica of the casino vault to practice maneuvering past its challenging security system. Within a few days, the group hatches a plan. High jinks ensue, hurdles are dodged, and (spoiler alert!) the team eventually escapes with the cash.

Ocean and Ryan could never have robbed the Bellagio alone. Not only would they have needed months to gather the financial resources required to prepare for the heist, it’s unlikely that they could have concocted a reasonable plan to bypass the casino’s defensive measures by only the two of them. By assembling a team just the right size with just the right skills, they cut down on their execution time and increased their chances of success. ...