Background: Today, It?s not uncommon that international companies and organizations have a higher turnover than the GDP of developing countries. Consequently, this may suggest that the choices companies make in the context of their business has a great potential to influence the world from an economic, but also from a social and environmental standpoint. From this the notion emerged that companies have a responsibility, referred to as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). A clear definition of the CSR concept is difficult to find, more than 37 different definitions has been identified.

Historiskt sett har begreppet corporate governance, med svensk term bolagsstyrning, endast haft sekundär betydelse inom det ekonomiska området. Under de senaste åren har dock bolagsstyrning utvecklats till ett av näringslivets viktigaste fokus. För den breda massan är det främst redovisningsskandalerna under början av 2000-talet som bidragit till den allmänna diskussionen. Corporate governance handlar dock till stor del om att styra bolag så att de uppfyller ägarnas krav på avkastning och därigenom bidrar till samhällsekonomisk effektivitet och tillväxt, dvs. en utgångspunkt utöver kriminella handlingar och bedrägligt beteende.

This study where designed to investigate if there are any positive relationship between the extent of physical activity during adolescent's leisure time and the academic performance, and also if there are any negative relationship between the academic performance and the time spent in front of the television or computers. Another part of the study tried to find out if physical activity has a direct and immediate influence on the performance in school. 91 pupils (51 girls and 40 boys) in the 8:th year of the Swedish primary school, from three different schools participated in the study. All 91 pupils first responded to a questionnaire concerning there activities in leisure time. They where then tested in a mathematical test and the results where compared with the extent of physical activity and TV/computer time they had stated in the questionnaire.

Syftet med vårt arbete var att studera vilka övningar och arbetsmetoder en amerikansk skola använder för att förbättra elevers muntliga framställning. Den empiriska delen av vår undersökning genomfördes i en amerikansk skola med 20 elever i åldrarna 12-13. Observationerna genomfördes i ämnena performance, council samt speech. Studien var av kvalitativ karaktär och genomfördes med ostrukturerade observationer. Vi kände snabbt stor skillnad mellan de svenska skolor vi besökt tidigare under vår utbildning och den amerikanska skolan beträffande elevernas vilja att tala.

Background: The international accounting standard regarding goodwill gives opportunities to several accounting procedure choices, as goodwill is a complex, intangible asset. The valuation of goodwill affects equity/asset ratio and income statement, which gives that the stakeholders? impression of the group?s financial statement is affected by the valuation of this asset. It has been pointed out that difficult economic times bring impairment loss to the fore. During financial crisis, equity/asset ratio may be significant as the economy of the groups is expected to be strained.Purpose: The purpose of this essay is to explain the appearance of the possible relationship between a group?s impairment loss for goodwill and their equity/asset ratio, during financial straits.

The purpose of this essay is to examine Banverket?s problems with its current financial model as it relates to reporting on operations and maintenance work, and to propose measures to simplify the model..

For a company to get the best possible profitability, requires financial planning. Budgeting isa common tool in financial planning. For operating lamb producers, a planning program suchas Agriwise is a good tool. Individual lamb producers may change certain standard figureswithin the planning program to better correspond with reality of the individual cases. In thisway, lamb producers may plan according to which revenues and costs they may expect thenext period.

In this master thesis, control algoritms using arm side sensors are investigated for an industrial robot. The sensors can be position encoders placed after the gearbox and accelerometers on the robot arms. Control strategies are discussed and evaluated for different models of the robot, after which chosen strategies are applied to a realistic model. Control algoritms using arm side sensors (LQ, dual-loop and PD-PID) are compared to a PID-controller that only uses measurements of motor position for feedback control. The comparison are done with respect to disturbance rejection, oscillation damping, robustness and tracking performance of a reference trajectory.

In this study the speech of adolescents with unilateral cleft lip andpalate (UCLP) and delayed closure of the hard palate was evaluated.Evaluations were made with experienced speech-language pathologists(SLP:s) and lay listeners. The SLP evaluation consisted of typical cleft palatespeech variables and some of them were adapted for lay listeners. Attitudestowards the speech of the adolescents were investigated by asking laylisteners if the speech constituted any hindrance to vocational performance.The SLP:s mainly found nasal escape and velopharyngeal impairment (VPI),although to a small degree and extent. The lay listeners mainly foundresonance deviations and indistinct speech. The latter was associated withhindrance to vocational performance.

Restrictions in nature conservations are increasing the influence of forest management. Nobel broadleaved forests are more influenced than other forests, because they are considered to be more valuable than other forest types in Skåne. There has been a lack of knowledge about the amount that is set-aside for nature conservation and what types of forest that is concerned. These are the main questions to be answered in this thesis. Moreover has the timber quality been compared between set-aside and non-set-aside areas since it affect the financial conditions for the forestry in nobel broadleved forests. The last asked question deals with the financial consequences of set-aside.

This study aims to examine how performance management is compatible with the operations at Sida, Sweden?s International Development Cooperation Agency, by performing interviews with representatives from Sida. The public sector is facing increased demands on accounting, which has emerged as an institutionalized social norm in society. The nature of Sida?s operations, however, proves to be highly complex, rendering results based management difficult to implement.

Because of an increasing demand from customers and changing external environment, there is a need for continuous improvements, for both manufacturing and service organizations, to meet these demands. Manufacturing organizations have been working systematically with quality improvements for a long time, but it has not been as common for service organizations. Because of that the methods to use for implementation of the systematic improvements have not been designed to fit service organizations, and not either for public organizations. The purpose of this thesis is to explain if and why the Swedish Road Administration?s organizational culture and handling of ideas and deviation support an implementation of continuous improvement management.

Syfte: Undersökningens syfte är att bidra till forskning om sammansättningen av Sveriges styrelser och dess påverkan på bolagets framgång. Metod: Denna undersökning har en deduktiv ansats och består av dels dataanalys och dels intervjuer. Den kvantitativa dataanalysen undersöker egenskaper hos styrelseledamöterna och kopplingen till företagets börskurser. Den kvalitativa intervjudelen undersöker åsikter hos personer insatta i styrelsearbete. Teoretiska perspektiv: Vi valde att utgå ifrån de teorier om Corporate Governance och team som stödjer antagandet att en heterogent sammansatt grupp presterar bättre än en homogent.

As stocks have become a more common way for people to save their money, the range of financial information has had a substantial increase. To understand the assumptions that stock valuation and analysis are built upon, it is important for the reader to have an understanding for the models that are used by banks and institutions when recommendations are published.The cash flow model, which is the most commonly used stock valuation tool, is based on CAPM. This model describes the relationship between an assets return and its risk in relation to an index. The risk parameter is called the beta value and has grown to be the dominating risk factor within financial economics literature.The use of beta values has been widely discussed in the world of academics and some researchers claim that the degree of explanation brought about by the beta is so low that it should be discarded, others are faithful to the beta and believe that it still serves a purpose. As a result of this criticism other ways to calculate the beta have surfaced, models that take other factors of risk into consideration.

Idag kommunicerar allt fler företag externt om sitt CSR-arbete. Då den externa kommunikationen inte samstämmer med det interna arbetet så uppstår särkoppling som kan ge kritik som greenwashing. Företaget Vattenfall har fått sådan kritik, vilket gör det intressant att studera företagets interna arbete. Syftet med uppsatsen är att beskriva och få en ökad förståelse för hur CSR används och uppfattas internt bland medarbetare genom att undersöka problem som företaget kan möta i sitt interna CSR-arbete. Vår uppsats bygger på en kvalitativ studie.