Business continuity and disaster recovery planning is comprised of activities that an organization must perform in order to resume operations after an unexpected event. This quantitative, correlational study explored the relationships of leadership characteristics and leadership frame orientation to the efficacy of business continuity and disaster recovery planning in higher education. Data was collected by surveying the emergency response coordinators in various academic departments within two major research universities in southern California. The data collected from the interviews was entered into a statistical software program which analyzed the data for correlations. This study could provide a framework for leaders to assess their organizations' capacity for recovery from an unexpected disruption and be used by organizational leaders to assign contingency planning responsibilities or hire business continuity and disaster recovery planning professionals.