In a time when milk producing farm businesses face decline in profitability it is of great importance to examine how the situation can be improved. This thesis is a study off efficiency in milk producing farm businesses represented by Swedish, Dutch and German farms. The aim of this study is to investigate whether any differences exist between companies in these countries. Moreover, the study includes a mapping of a number of factors that determine how efficient milk production can be managed. This mapping is based on a literature review on prior efficiency studies followed by qualitative interviews with milk production advisors as well as a questionnaire sent out to dairy farmers in Sweden.

AB Sandvik Cormorant?s production unit in Gimo has identified a need to examinethe handling of products between operations with the purpose of generatingproposals of improvement for the product handling.The aim of this project is to study the existing manufacturing process and givesuggestions for improvement. The proposals should reduce the manual handling ofproducts, decrease the risk of damaging the products during the manufacturing andform a basis for increased traceability. Based on a mapping of the manufacturingprocess and the problem description, a specification of requirements has beencomposed.The mapping of the manufacturing process suggests that a change of the currentsystem is required. The company is recommended to decide how the producthandling between operations should be performed as guidelines for the productionteam.

Sustainable development is often pictured as containing of three interlinked dimensions- namely environmental, economic and social. ?Social sustainability? is a vague concept that is often thought of as highly context-dependent. This thesis sets out to investigate the meaning of ?social sustainability? in a given context.

Digital games are today avaliable on all kinds of different platform. Games and game thinking is also increasingly being applied within non-traditional contexts. This thesis explores the term "gamifiation" which can be defined as "the use of game design elements in non-game contexts". The purpose of the study was to identify and give perspective on the discourse surrounding the use and applicability of the term today. More specifically, it explores the possibilities of the potentially value creating ability in the context of work, and focused on the application of gamified software in the context of project work.

I denna uppsats beskrivs och implementeras tre alternativa metoder för att skatta kovariansen mellan finansiella tillgångar. De utvärderas sinsemellan och jämförs med stickprovskovariansen. Utvärderingsmodellen innebär simulering av en aktiv portföljförvaltare i en verklighetstrogen miljö. Då kovariansen mellan finansiella tillgångar beräknas med stickprovsskattning blir skattningsfelet stort. Detta fel, eller brus, försämrar portföljförvaltares resultat och alternativa metoder eftersöks.

The focus of this essay is to investigate if there lies a difference between graffiti art that is placed in the public spaces and graffiti art that is sited in an institutional art setting; in this essay exemplified in a gallery space. My thesis is that graffiti art derives a great deal of its meaning and substance from its situation consequently making a change of cultural context also a change of connotation and understanding of the graffiti art itself.  Meaning that graffiti art situated in a communal space is different from graffiti art situated in the gallery space. They share aesthetic expression but their connotations differ; i.e. one being illegal and the other permissible making their meanings dissimilar. I have used a comparison between site-specific art and graffiti art to further strengthen my thesis concerning the importance of understanding how a change of context critically changes the substance of graffiti art..

This report is the result of a thesis carried out during the spring of 2010 at Sandvik Coromant in Gimo. The purpose of this thesis has been to make an inventory and mapping of information used by flow groups that are most relevant for the day-to-day work. This mapping will then form the basis for information supplied by an automated system.The project consisted of:Identifying how the information is supplied today.Inquiring into the needs of an automated system.Which needs of information that will be provided by the system.Data collection occurred in two ways, both through observations and interviews. Observations of the participants were carried out early in the thesis, where the aim was to create a picture of the problem, and gradually develop a basis for the actual interview study. At each observation, an unstructured observation was used, which means that all activity was recorded.

AbstraktEn avgörande faktor för att kunna förebygga, avhjälpa eller lindra matematiksvårigheter är ifall pedagoger har kompetens att genomföra en kartläggning, som ger vägledning för fortsatta pedagogiska insatser (Lundberg & Sterner, 2009). Med detta som utgångspunkt var syftet med studien att undersöka yrkesverksamma specialpedagogers syn på kartläggning och yngre elevers räknesvårigheter samt hur de går till väga vid en pedagogisk kartläggning i matematik. Studien har en kvalitativ ansats med semistrukturerad intervju som metod. Deltagarna i undersökningen är två specialpedagoger med gedigen utbildning och erfarenhet inom området. Resultatet av undersökningen visar att informanterna har en formativ syn på kartläggning.

To contribute to understanding of how Thai cultural context affects the leadership of expatriates in management positions. Instead of modifying the leadership styles to fit the local (Thai) context, the expatriates tried to push and influence their culture and leadership styles to Thai employees..

Physiotherapists treat people with different views of the world and medical beliefs, which require a good understanding of cultural differences. One way to achieve cultural understanding is through self-reflection in a new context. During five weeks the authors, two physiotherapy students, completed a clinical practice at the rehabilitation center Pina Palmera, Zipolite, Oaxaca, Mexico. At the beginning of the period a critical incident was chosen, when the head physiotherapist for the ward Cuidados Especiales intended to sell jewellery to the authors during a treatment of a patient. The authors have by using the reflection framework "Framework to guide reflective process", and Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) for analysis, discussed different ways of communication, adherence, education, and self-reflection and critical thinking.

Previous research about contextual effects on advertising has mainly focused on the editorial context, while advertisements' broader context has been overlooked. This paper aims to take a broader perspective on advertisement context. Its purpose is to get an understanding on how physical exercise influence the effectiveness of print advertisements, and furthermore to look at the effects of thematic incongruence between ad and the physical environment. We hypothesize that physical exercise increase ad effectiveness through affective priming and that thematic incongruence is beneficial for ads' effectiveness, especially after training when awareness about the environment is higher. A 2×2 experiment was conducted in a gym, where each respondent was exposed to either an incongruent or less incongruent ad, before or after physical exercise.

The main purpose of this paper is to examine how students in school year nine in the Swedish school come in contact with history outside of the school context. The paper also focuses on, if and how the students consider the contact with history as something different than, or similar to the history education that takes place during school hours, the student´s interest in history will also be examined. To gather the student?s opinions on these subjects, I have done interviews with eight students divided into two groups, with one group consisting of four girls and one group with two boys and two girls. The interviews took place at the students school located in a smaller city in Värmlands län, Sweden.

Value stream mapping is a tool that is frequently used by many different companies. It is a great tool used to achieve the work that follows the theories of lean production. The tool is used, however, only frequent on the factory floor and the method is also designed based on this type of use.An interest of applying the method on administrative parts of the company has occurred lately. Administrative parts of the company refers to the part that does all the planning such as purchasing, receiving orders, customer contact, contact with factory floor and other work that is made around the actual manufacturing. But the knowledge about applying value stream mapping on the planning part of the company is lacking because the method is relatively new.In this work, a comparison is made between the introduction of value stream analysis on production and planning.

The purpuse of this study was to develop knowledge about learning condition that are to be in a context of interaction with persons that have Autism Spectrum Disorder diagnosis are included. The pre-understanding has evidence in that the public very often has a lack of knowledge in understanding persons with this kind of disabilities that can put the social interplay in disharmony. The phenomenological approach was used to reach the essence of the learning influence processes. Seen from the respondents experiences of interaction as a help for the informal learning in a working context. The purpose was to see the result of interplay and the effect of learning condition and to see what help those respondents acctually have experienced.

This report is the result of a thesis at the company Sanmina in O?rnsko?ldsvik. The thesis is the final work at the mechanical engineering program at Umea? University.Sanmina has in 2015 launched an initiative to ensure that all sites are using LEAN principles and tools to enhance their business. As part of the plan for the LEAN-work, an LSS (Lean Six Sigma)-project has started to study the company's receivehall and inspection.