Leading during a crisis can be regarded as contingency leadership because the situation demands that the leader emphasize certain behaviors, attitudes, and traits. Crisis leadership is the process of leading group members through a sudden and largely unanticipated, intensely negative, and emotionally draining circumstance. Leadership is the key ingredient in successful crisis management. Effective crisis leadership ensures that a business is prepared before a crisis emerges, and that successfully navigates response and recovery.

Here we describe nine leadership attributes and behaviors associated with successfully leading an organization or organizational unit through a crisis. The best-accepted principle of crisis leadership is that the leader should take decisive action to remedy the situation. The greater the crisis, the less time the leader has to consult a wide array of people. After the plan is formulated, it should be widely communicated to help reassure group members that something concrete is being done about the predicament.

A corollary of being decisive during a crisis is not to be indecisive or to hide from the crisis in its midst. The first phase of crisis leadership is to stabilize the emergency situation and buy time. Being decisive in response to a crisis also includes communicating widely the plans for resolving the problems that created the crisis, assuming that the organization had some responsibility for the crisis. Displaying compassion during a crisis is key.

Compassionate leadership brings about organizational healing involves taking some form of public action that eases pain and inspires others to act as well. During an organizational crisis, it is even more important for a leader to think strategically and see the big picture, because subordinates may become so mired in the crisis that they see no way out. Transformational leadership is likely to benefit the troubled organization both in dealing with the immediate crisis and in performing better in the long run.