Bob Higgins knew his reign as CEO would eventually come to a close, but he wanted to take matters into his own hands. Barge Design Solutions’ longtime leader spent the past three years planning the perfect succession. Here’s his “secret sauce” to handing over a business.
Higgins announced this week that he is leaving the top position at Barge Design Solutions on Feb. 28, transitioning to chairman of the board. Carrie Stokes, who has served as chief of staff since the start of the year, will succeed Higgins.
In February of 2022, Higgins, who has led Barge Design Solutions for nearly 16 years, went to his board and said, “If I had it my way, February 2025 would be the day.”
“I’d been in the role at that time about 12 years and [was] talking with my wife and my family, my daughter will be going to be college. We’ll have a plan for all that,” Higgins said in an interview. “It was important to me to leave from a position where Barge was doing really well. Sometimes people stay too long. The old saying is, ‘It’s better to retire a day early or a year early than a day late.’ That’s important.”
Higgins asked for six months to finalize a succession plan. He collected board feedback and worked with a professor at Berkeley who specializes in leadership transitions to put it together.
“Any CEO is about succession planning and making sure we’ve got backups to the backups. That’s been a part of this whole 15-year process,” Higgins said. “But now, we’ve got to talk about me. There’s always been that backup plan for Bob if an emergency happens, but now we’ve got to talk about a sustainable future here.”
What emerged was an in-depth succession strategy focused on putting current lower-level employees through an intensive leadership program to prepare them for all C-suite positions.
Here was Higgins’ “secret sauce” for a smooth transition:
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