Crises are unexpected events that have the capacity to change the very core of an organization’s values. They can have compounding effects beyond the walls of an organization. They are moments where decision-making becomes critical and where the repertoire of possible actions widens, in light of threats, emerging or previously identified, volatile circumstances, and the need for direction. Crisis leadership is a skill that organizations can mobilize and that can be learned. Leadership failures during crises have effects on motivation, culture, and turnover intention. Leaders have to embody the strategic direction of their enterprise, in order to keep their employees committed to the changing strategic priorities of the agency during times of crises, whether they are leading private, nonprofit, or public sector organizations. There are advancements in the leadership literature, in the realm of adaptive and authentic leadership that crisis scholarship needs to take stock of and vice versa. Indeed, as risks remain undetected, or poorly communicated up the chain of command, they may become full-scale crises that are at times emerging from human-technological interactions, inevitable and unforeseen. The next generation of leaders must be prepared to deal with systemic complexity, a workforce comprised of multiple generations with varying expectations from their leaders. This chapter will review the recent literature on the successful and least successful leadership styles for times of unprecedented events. The authors will explore the forms of crisis leadership can take, and their relation to employee motivation during times of crisis.