Globalization and demographic changes are forcing today?s companies to be more competitive in order to reach success. The increasing competition is proving a challenge for companies to recruit and retain competent, talented staff. To meet these challenges, Talent Management was developed during the 1990s and supplies a new and innovative way to deal with personnel management. Due to Talent Management being a relatively new theory, there is at present no generally accepted definition of the theory.

This thesis is a case study of the informal internal communication at a Swedish government agency called Swedac. The purpose of the study was to investigate how the employees perceive and use the informal internal communication, what communication media they utilize for it and how the informal internal communication correlates to certain aspects of the organizational structure. In order to achieve this, six qualitative interviews was carried out with employees in the organization. Since informal internal communication is not a well-defined concept I explained my view of the concept in the thesis. The results show that the informal internal communication is very important and fairly widespread at Swedac.

The purpose of this essay is primarily to investigate the possibility of and the rules concerning using quotas in the field of admission to university. Secondly, an investigation of whether the Swedish Police Academy has been conducting this method during the years of 2009 and 2010 is made. They are currently accused of having discriminated applicants due to their gender and ethnicity. In order to examine the legal arena as far as possible the laws of discrimination, both including the legislations and regulations assumed by the EU as well as the Swedish laws in this field, will be studied. The laws of discrimination will be put in relation to the legal possibilities of making exceptions from the principle of equal treatment.

The system tungsten-oxygen has potential of being suitable for decorative coatings since ceramic coatings are often hard and wear resistant, and since modulations in oxygen content or incorporation of small ions could give bright colours. The aim of this report was to investigate the relationship between process parameters and  the properties of the films, with the wear resistance being of special interest.Samples with tungsten to oxygen ratios in the range of 100:0 to 25:75 at% were made using reactive sputter deposition, either with constant gas flow, or gas flow controlled by optical emission of the plasma. The hysteresis of the system, which means that a certain gas flow will cause different pressure and/or target voltage depending on in what way the flow is reached, makes it interesting to control the process where the system makes the steep change from metallic tungsten to ceramic tungsten oxide. This is difficult and thus requires precise control equipment.The samples were analysed using X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and an empirical wear test suitable for small components like cell phone cover for example, in order to characterize the structure, composition and wear resistance of the coatings. The results could be divided into three groups: (I) tungsten-like, with very low oxygen content; (II) mixed phase and (III) tungsten oxide like, with oxygen content close to 75 at%.

The title of the study is: "Stories about helpful conversations - a narrative study of active processes in therapy and treatment." The purpose of this study was to examine clients' stories of what has been helpful to them in therapy / treatment. The study has been made in light of the ongoing discussion in society about the requirements for empirical studies within welfare areas. The choice to make a narrative study comes from the desire to have clients' own stories at the centre of what has been helpful in the therapeutic process. The author has interviewed and talked with four people (clients) who told us about their experiences of therapy / treatment. Narrative research methodology is based on people's life stories.

AbstractThe recruiting of lay judges to the district courts is managed by the political parties. Despite repeated efforts the parties do not succeed in recruiting lay judges that reflect the structure of the inhabitants. Why not? This is the fundamental issue of this essay.This study is a multiple case study of two parties with different success in their recruiting work. The purpose is to study the process of nomination regarding lay judges at the district courts, at the latest election (2006).

During the last years, the importance of sourcing in firms has increased. Globalization, fierce competition and an increased level of outsourcing are common explanations to why firms have highlighted the potential to realize savings and the value creation that the Purchasing department can generate. One trend that follows in parallel with globalization is an increased pressure from society on firms to take responsibility for the impact that its products and services have on the environment. This responsibility creates even more attention as outsourcing involves trade with suppliers in low wage countries, where the level of environmental and social responsibility is not always satisfying. The Purchasing department, the firm?s interface with suppliers should therefore, together with the firm?s Environmental department, play a key role in the firm?s contribution towards sustainable development.

The number of ideas at innovative companies usually exceeds the amount of available human ormaterial recourses, this include ideas for development of new products. Since they are not able to doeverything they want to do they have to choose between ideas to develop new products. This includesthe decision on when to start, stop or kill a project as well as the thought process of prioritizing betweenongoing and potential projects.Project Portfolio Management (PPM) is an organizational process, with the purpose of systematicallyorganizing and running the activities that aim to evaluate, select and prioritize ideas and projects fordeveloping new products. PPM include four major goals to be fulfilled; Maximizing Value of thePortfolio, Achieving a Balanced Portfolio, Achieving a Strategic Alignment and Running the RightNumber of Projects.The purpose of the thesis was to develop a more visual and formal PPM process for the early stages inproduct development in one department at St Jude Medical AB, Sweden.The thesis was conducted by following a methodology known as Process Modules. The methodology isan approach for developing a PPM process that fits a specific company.

In what way has the ethnic housing segregation changed from the 1970´s until today and has the politics concerning these matters dealt with the ethnic segregation as a phenomenon that occur due to free choices of ethnic groups or as a stigmatization and marginalization of ethnic groups? To be able to find out what actual changes there are to be seen in the political measures regarding the ethnic housing segregation from the 70´s until today, I have made a discoursive investigation of some of the states official investigations from each of the decades. I chose to focus on a qualitative analysis and my theoretical framework consists of theories considering grouprights as well as structural and cultural explanations.I realize that the changes have been proportionately high retorically, but the actual changes have not been that obvious. I find a retorical development that has changed from the idea of the great impact of the immigrant in the ethnic segregation process, at the same time as huge differences between groups emerge, to establish a gap between us an them and a stigmatization of ethnic groups. The development somehow seems to have reconnected to the first stage.

This study focuses on a specific organization of a Security Operations Center (SOC) as a case studyto first identify specific challenges related to the work process, preceding with identifying whichprinciples from various process models, such as agile and traditional methodologies from softwaredevelopment companies, can be implemented. Initially, the study presents relevant research on agile and traditional process models as well asresearch on SOC. Subsequently, six semi-structured interviews are planned and conducted withemployees within a specific SOC-type organization to identify the current work process and thechallenges affecting the organization?s work process. The results of this study indicate a description of the current work process in the organization aswell as a variety of challenges related to technical and organizational issues.

In 2003 the deciding political council in Bromölla municipality requested that an overhaul on the committee and public administration structure should be conducted. In the report Bromölla was characterized as a traditional organization with a low degree of change. This case study will examine why the organization previously has been reluctant to change its structure and why they are willing to do so now. In the pursuit of this objective I conducted document studies, interviews and observations. I have used theories on, institutional change and organizational culture to enlighten this.My findings shows that the traditionalists within the organization has greatly affected this reluctance towards change, in the deciding council 39 % of the representatives are 60 years or older.

In 2003 the deciding political council in Bromölla municipality requested that an overhaul on the committee and public administration structure should be conducted. In the report Bromölla was characterized as a traditional organization with a low degree of change. This case study will examine why the organization previously has been reluctant to change its structure and why they are willing to do so now. In the pursuit of this objective I conducted document studies, interviews and observations. I have used theories on, institutional change and organizational culture to enlighten this.My findings shows that the traditionalists within the organization has greatly affected this reluctance towards change, in the deciding council 39 % of the representatives are 60 years or older.

The purpose of our essay is to investigate the social services work for youth with hazardous behavior. To aquire relevant information we decided to us the qualitative method. We made five interviews with social workers from different sections to get a full view of the situation. The main conclutions we came up with is the importance of the family structure, and a safe home environment with good values. Another important part is a daily meaningful occupation, for the main part in this age it is school attendance.

The creation of Region Skåne, and the transfer of the development responsibility from the national administrative country board (Länsstyrelsen) has given the state new challenges. New structures have grown between Region and State, and also between different municipalities. These can be characterized as Policy-networks, and the goal of this study is to analyze the planning process of the regional infrastructure with these theories.This is a qualitative study of the infrastructure process in Skåne, and the actors that acts within this process. It has been studied with the eyes of the theories of Governance and Policy-networks. The main method to collect material has been through interviews with different actors within the process, and very little written material has been used.

Local politicians are key actors in the democratic system and their ideas concerning democracy plays a central role in local democratic politics. The study's point of departure is the notion that local politicians are dependent of coherence between practice and theory concerning democracy and in the study of their ideas we acquire knowledge about the democratic practice.This study examines the local politicians? view of Swedish democracy and explores the logic of the discourse that makes statements concerning democracy possible. Twenty local politicians have been interviewed and from the material a discourse have been established through the use of formulation of problems and cause, nodal points and chains of analogy which is compared with democratic ideals.The study comes to the conclusion that a hegemonic discourse exists, in which central nodal points are representative and listening. The idea of the representative system is hegemonic and is based in the liberal democratic ideal although the view of the citizens rather can be traced to the radical, communitarian and deliberative ideal.