This study puts emphasis on an international discourse describing how cities frequently compete against each other, and also describing factors that cities should enhance to make themselves more competitive. The discourse in this study has therefore been used to seek understanding how three different municipalities Borlänge, Karlstad and Malmö strive for growth by applying central factors from the discourse on the municipalities strategic documents. What the study shows is that the central factors from the discourse strongly imprints the strategic documents, but the presence of the factors varies between the municipalities and also to what meaning that lies behind the strategic goals..

The main purpose of this essay is to investigate if Latvia´s pattern of trade has become more similar to the mature market economies, after Latvia´s independence 1991.Today, the intra-industry trade (IIT) dominates the trade of mature market economies. One of the pioneers of intra-industrial trade is Paul Krugman, who was the first to emphasize the importance "of scale and consumers' desire for variety" in explaining the basis for modern commerce. Customers get more variety and usually cheaper goods when the market gets bigger. I mainly use the modern trade theories to explain the trade pattern in Latvia. To measure how Latvia has developed its intra-industry trade, and thereby is approaching the mature market economies´ trade pattern, I use the Grubel-Lloyd index (GL-index).

European cities of today are under the challenge to find ways to stay competitive and flourish in a rapidly changing world, where the old patterns of centrality and periphery not necessarily holds true. New and improved communication networks, a changed political geography in Europe, and the globalisation of not only the financial and industrial markets but also to a certain extent the globalisation of people, have all led to great challenges for cities and regions.In a changed spatial reality the classic monocentric models are challenged by newer models of urbanisation. The polycentric urban region is one such model which has been used to describe urban regions like the Randstad in the Netherlands and the Rhein-Ruhr region in Germany. Regions which lack the single dominant central city of the monocentric models of old, and instead shows a high degree of more equal-sized and sometimes more specialised cities in regional cooperation. The polycentric urban region is in that aspect a possible model for how other urbanised regions in Europe may act to be able to position themselves as attractive urban regions and regional hubs in the European urban network.Polycentric urban regions are not a universal solution, though.

På senare tid har konkurrensen om kunder ökat bland företag vilket gör att behovet av konkurrentanalyser har ökat. Trähusbranschen är en bransch där behovet av konkurrentanalys är extra stort eftersom det finns många företag som konkurrerar på en begränsad och konjunkturkänslig marknad. Konkurrensen inom branschen blir dessutom hårdare eftersom kunderna oftast är privatpersoner med stora krav på produkten men med en begränsad ekonomi. I denna rapport har konkurrensförhållandena inom trähusbranschen undersökts på en geografiskt begränsad marknad. Undersökningen inriktades på att hitta de absolut viktigaste faktorerna som gör en husleverantör framgångsrik.

In today?s fast changing environment it is important for knowledge intense companies that want to stay competitive to actively work with their knowledge, knowledge sharing and Knowledge Management (KM). Barriers decrease the efficiency of how knowledge is created, stored and shared, and they are therefore important to reduce or preferably remove making the KM activities result in as much value for the organisation as possible. To achieve this, it is important that the KM activities become a natural part of the employees? daily work.

The study aims to examine how the people who have received special needs education during their schooling have experienced it.Since I wanted to take advantage of people's experiences of special needs education, I chose to conduct qualitative research interviews. Five people in the ages of 21-26 years old participated in the study.A summary of the work says that special needs education creates mixed feelings, feelings of joy and alienation. The positive as described in the work is that the special education teaching has created a classroom that is aligned along the pupil's needs and circumstances. All informants have expressed that their negative experiences is about them having to leave the common classroom.Keywords: exclusion, inclusion, special needs education, student needs.

During the spring of 2013 we developed a visual identity for Jönköping Bandy, a bandy association in Jönköping, which was founded in 1947.Jönköping Bandy?s main problem was the low interest for the association by the local people. The association also had problems with the economy, which made it hard for them to merchandise themselves.In Jönköping, there were a lot of sport associations, and therefore, it was difficult to find sponsors. One way to help the association, was to create a good visual identity for them. A visual identity that would reflect on the proper values of the association.The intention was: ?Through graphical design, we want to convey Jönköping Bandy to a larger amount of people, and get increased knowledge in graphical idiom.? and was torn apart into these three questions:What core values does Jönköping Bandy have, and how can we convey them through the visual identity?Which visual materials does Jönköping Bandy need?How do other teams in Allsvenskan Södra merchandise themselves through their websites?The work began with a study of relevant theoretical literature, with focus on graphical design.

There is now a trend to move closer to the customer in the form of long-term and lastingrelationships. The market today is characterized by growing competition with new playersconstantly arising. In order to gain Competitive advantage with the increasingly challengingmarket, companies require to place the customer in the centre. Being close to the customerand engage in successful efforts to create customer loyalty has become a critical successfactor in many businesses. Especially when the customers in today's market is becomingincreasingly unfaithful and continuously looking for new companies with new productofferings.Many companies have now also realized the importance of trying to retain existing customersas it is more profitable than constantly trying to acquire new ones.

The Intellectual Capital Statement facilitates the mapping of interdependent and simultaneously impacting intellectual capital factors in a unique way. The process-orientation of the German approach differentiates it from its predecessors and gives an advantage over alternative procedures. By combining these aspects with the possibility to communicate the company?s efforts and progress in the field of intellectual capital, the German Intellectual Capital Statement (Wissensbilanz) provides an effective management tool..

Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) is one of the leading causes of acute encephalitis in humans. The virus is spread by mosquitoes, mainly belonging to the Culex species. The main reservoirs are considered to be birds and pigs, with pigs constituting the most important reservoir in regard to human infection. During the last few decades the production of pork has increased significantly in Vietnam. With 90% of pigs being kept in households owning 10 pigs or less, pigs are widely spread across most parts of the country.

Problem/frågeställningar: När företagsledare runt om i världen ska ta beslut uppgår 40% av dessa beslut till att baseras på magkänslan. Ett påstående kring konkurrensfördelar och magkänsla är att ?ett av de största hindren för konkurrensfördelar är att agera enbart på magkänsla eller intuition?. Denna uppsats tar fasta på det påståendet och granskar hur BI, ett verktyg som stödjer företagsledarna i sina beslut, spelar in. Ett synsätt för att studera konkurrensfördelar är det resursbaserade synsättet, där resurser följaktligen är grunden i det som skapar konkurrensfördelar.

This study puts emphasis on an international discourse describing how cities frequently compete against each other, and also describing factors that cities should enhance to make themselves more competitive. The discourse in this study has therefore been used to seek understanding how three different municipalities Borlänge, Karlstad and Malmö strive for growth by applying central factors from the discourse on the municipalities strategic documents. What the study shows is that the central factors from the discourse strongly imprints the strategic documents, but the presence of the factors varies between the municipalities and also to what meaning that lies behind the strategic goals..

Talented people are recognised as being the most important corporate resource over the next twenty years and a competitive compensation system is an important tool in attracting and retaining talent. Traditional pay systems are recognised as being neither cost effective nor motivating people to do more. Often these systems do not contribute to strategic objectives. This study outlines what constitutes an intelligent remuneration system that will enhance the mind value added by knowledge workers, reward knowledge creation, and contribute to organisational strategies..

Background: According to many authorities Trademark consideration will within the companies become all more prioritized objectives for Competitive advantage and a strong organisational structure.Trade marking is becoming an important tool, not only Production oriented companies apply this on their products or services whereas it is today spread in many different sectors.Problems: On the basis of theoretical and empirical studies, we will try to see how a trademark is built up.This will guide us to our questions at issue:? How has the actual process for HTF been in order to strengthen and to build up their trademark, how have they achieved this in practice?? What are the underlying criteria?s to for this work and what role has the consultant company BMN in the actual process?Aim: The authors have for intention to create an understanding on why there is interesting for a trade union organisation like HTF to carry out a trademark development investment. A further understanding will be to highlighting a strong trademark's advantages and possible disadvantages.Results: As a trade union organisation where the relationship to the members and the potential members is becoming all more important is the interesting to highlight their trademark clear and in addition to that contribute to building and establishing strong relationships. on the basis of this study we can state that it is now one of the most important support activities that as a trade unions to highlight its core values through trademark. As a trade union, one can to a large extent work with and to apply the market the economic mocks-up for trademark build up.The most important aspect is that we can state , in the future developed to concentrate more on communication, positioning, segmentation and diversification, which the trademark act as intermediary.

By interviewing 10 people in leadership positions from various companies and      countries, this thesis had as main objective to find out how the view the of what environment promotes the intrapreneur to make the organizations more competitive and successful. By transcribing and interpreting the interviews, we have found the keywords that could answer our research question. Our method has been based on a qualitative approach with an inductive direction. The leadership has been shown to have a significant role in terms of company culture and the intrapreneurs ability to contribute to the development of the organizations. The culture is essential.