The COVID-19 pandemic has brought about many complex challenges and opportunities, calling for a reexamination of leadership development curricula. This paper proposes adopting a competency-based approach to better prepare leaders for crisis events, like COVID-19. I used an HR practitioner's lens that informs human resource development scholarship and practice for my research on crisis leadership competency models. Based on that research, I propose that a model developed by Wooten and James, along with one developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, be used as a basis for constructing a competency framework to inform and improve leadership development programs.