”Jag är inte ute på din arbetsplats och kan haffa dig i förbifarten, du behöver höra av dig om det är något.” : En kvalitativ studie om kommunikationens betydelse mellan konsult och konsultchef

Sammanfattning: The changes that have taken place during and after the Covid-19 pandemic are a fact, including the way managers communicate. This is because more and more employees are choosing to work from home, which represents a distance of communication between the manager and employee which they did not previously have. In contrast, remote communication in the consulting industry has been established since before the pandemic, where consulting managers are not present at the same workplace as the consultants. The aim of this study is to investigate the importance of managerial presence in communication between the manager and the employee in the consulting and staffing industry. To answer the aim, a comparison of the communication between a present and an absent manager is carried out. This is done using the concepts: communication, demands, control, support, availability and belonging. To answer the purpose, a comparative qualitative study has been conducted with three consultants and their respective consulting managers, where a comparison between the consultants' current workplace as a consultant and their then workplace when they were not working as a consultant is carried out. The empirical data is analyzed based on the theory of the requirement-controlsupport model, the theory of interaction and organizational identity. The study shows that clear communication and support in the form of the consultant manager's availability to the consultant contributes to an increased sense of control over the work and belonging to the consulting firm for the consultant. Thus, the fact that they do not communicate face-to-face does not matter, if the communication is clear, and the consultant feels a sense of security towards the consultant manager.