Title: A study about conditions for leadership in knowledge-intensive firms.Authors: Cecilia Ekström and Niklas SandbergKeywords: Leadership, knowledge-intensive firm, hierarchies, followers.Background: Leadership is becoming one of our greatest social myths and is considered a total solution for many problems that occur in an organization. The view of leadership is usually from a top-down perspective, which contributes to an often underestimated view of the follower. Just as it is important to understand the leader's view of leadership, it is important to understand how employees view the structure from which the leader derives its legitimacy. The existing conditions in knowledge-intensive firms, such as autonomy, place special demands on the formal leadership.Purpose: The purpose of this study takes an employee perspective, to understand what the conditions are for formal leadership in knowledge-intensive firms.Method: A qualitative research method was used and empirical material was collected through interviews with employees in knowledge-intensive firms. The empirical material was analyzed by the respondents? mental images which were set against the theoretical framework of the thesis.Conclusions: The conditions for formal leadership in knowledge-intensive firms make it advantageous to have a leader with a withdrawn role.

Leadership is essential for every company. Its strength or weakness of direction, clarity, and evaluation affects success or failure of its organization. With the complex structure of the big and global companies today leadership is more challenging. The traditional view of leadership, with the single individual possessing all the competences and skills, is therefore being challenged by an alternative way of leadership, a shared leadership. Existing research on the subject is still scarce, which makes further studies in this field important.

Background: Performance measurement as a management control tool has received considerable academic attention. As the number of inter-organisational relationships, such as customer-supplier relationships, increases, there is a new scope for performance measurement as a management control tool. In order for a company to assess the effectiveness of its supplier relationships it has to define, measure and evaluate variables that are critical for the success of the relationship. The role of management control, and thereby of performance measurement, has increasingly been discussed in theory. However, empirical research in this area is still somewhat limited.

The swedish song contest ?Melodifestivalen? is the most popular TV-show in Sweden according to number of viewers. Not only has it managed to remain the viewers? number-one choice year after year, it has also engaged a lot of the viewers (2, 4 millions in this year?s final) to vote for their favourite song. Melodifestivalen is classified as a creative organisation since it has evident elements of creativity in its process, product and among its employees.

This study has been executed at the Public Employment Office, an institution that has beensubject for much debate during the last couple of years. The government has instructed theLabour Market Board to change the Public Employment Office toward a more effectiveorganization. This study examines one of the Public Employment Offices that are included in apilot project that aims to improve and develop work methods with the objective to become amore service minded organization. From this starting point we have investigated which effect thisorganizational change has had on the employee within this organization and within the pilotproject. In addition we investigate whether attitudes of the unemployed has an effect on thestaff´s work situation.

Då människor befinner sig till stor del av sin vakna tid på arbetsplatsen har denna blivit en viktig arena för hälsofrämjande arbete. Studier visar hur viktigt det är för företag att ha en frisk och välmående personal. Fokus ligger då oftast på företagets behållning av hälsofrämjande arbete. Syftet med studien var därför att beskriva hur anställda upplevde hälsofrämjande arbete på sin arbetsplats. Kvalitativa intervjuer genomfördes med samtliga anställda på ett litet företag.

AbstractDue to the success of the Populist Party Sverigedemokraterna in the Swedish election of 2006, the daily paper Sydsvenska Dagbladet published a number of columns written by well-known academics, writers and debaters. Their aim was to address the question of why this happened in the election and what it is in the Swedish society today that brought forward these trends. The first and the last word was given to the writer Fredrik Ekelund, and therefore the debate was named Ekelunddebatten.The debaters are fighting to present their view of the world as the only option when categorizing different societal groups and appointing themselves as group representatives. My aim is to unravel these different conceptions of the world and to do this I use the Dicourse Analysis as a method. I discuss the results with Critical Discourse Theory as a theoretical base and also from the view of the current societal discourses: the working class discourse, the multicultural discourse and the discourse of political correctness.I mainly observe four different conceptions of the world with different posing of problems.

Researchers and practitioners have recognized the need for ?transforming? every policy of the company into a competitive advantage tool. Thus, both the pricing approach and the supply chain practices of the firm have emerged as an important determinant of success. In this study, however, we are not only interested in these two aspects, but also in a third one-namely cultural conflicts as an obstacle and challenge. The interaction of the tree factors is extensively presented against the backdrop of Skanska and four of their closest Polish suppliers.

The technological progress of the world has had a massive effect on how we communicate with one and other, it also has had an big impact on how companies communicate with their customers and consumers. Today you cannot only communicate a ?promise to your costumers and consumers you also have to ?deliver? what it is you promise. Strategic communication is today not only to market your product but to ensure that your strategic communication is shown even in you innovation, design and product development.  This thesis is conducted in collaboration with No Picnic AB.The purpose of this study was to get an insight in how Swedish companies use their strategic communication. We aim on bringing a new point of view of strategic communication with innovation, design and product development also as a communication channel.

When communications traffic increasingly turned into data, IP telephony became a disruptive technology for the telecommunication business. IP telephony was a hot topic when voice over IP services started to become available to consumers in the 1990s. The new technology changed the rules of the game and many new actors entered the market.The purpose of this study is to describe, study, and analyze how the business models of the Swedish telecom sector developed in the middle of the 2000s. The study is delimited to the Swedish consumer market for telephony.The study is built mainly upon deep interviews with 24 prominent persons in the telecom sector in 2006. To aid understanding, two telecom companies that have been chosen to represent different kinds of actors are described and analyzed more closely.

The study was performed for the Swedish Regional Forestry Board in Södra Götaland. The study examines broadleaf plantations on former farmland that were planted between 1991 and 1996 with subsidy payments for conversion of farmland into forest. In particular, the study reviews forests planted in 1991-92 and 1994-96. In the early 1990s, Swedish agriculture was deregulated and direct subsides to farmers ended. The Swedish state instead granted farmers financial support and offered incentives for conversion of farmland and investments in order to make their unproductive land productive. The state supported conversion of farmland to broadleaf forest, forest for energy biomass production, or establishment of wetlands on former farmland. The County Administrative Boards and Regional Forestry Boards together monitored the planting of broadleaf forests.

The purpose of this thesis was to analyse if the six month rule in chapter 3 § 9 part 1 in IL is compatible with EU law regarding the free movement of employees and in case of discrimination whether the rule can be justified. First of all the retroactive salary for an unlimited taxpayer and during the period of income earning a limited taxpayer who later became unlimited taxpayer will be analyzed in order to determine if they are considered to be in a comparable situation. An unlimited taxpayer is subject to taxation in Sweden for all of his incomes regardless their origin. However there is an exception according to six month rule, which implies that physical persons who stay abroad due to their minimum six months employment are in Sweden free from their incomes earned abroad if they are taxed in the country of employment. Tax exemption is applicable even if the payment from an employee working abroad is made retroactively.Article 18 EUFF states a general prohibition of discrimination on the grounds of nationality.

The global market is becoming increasingly integrated and to keep up with growing competition and to achieve even greater success, companies expand to foreign markets. Previous studies have shown that the concept of psychic distance has an important impact on international performance regarding small and medium-sized enterprises (SME). The aim of our study is to provide the reader with a deeper understanding of how psychic distance influences export performance regarding Swedish SMEs. Through a single case study of a Swedish SME, we chose to research three different markets in three different continents. Our findings show that psychic distance influences export performance through export marketing strategy and active learning.

 Performance appraisals- a study of the performance appraisals significance as a tool for development in the public sector.Anders Larsson and Åsalill OlssonPerformance appraisals have been given a central role in leading businesses in the public sector and are seen as a tool to create development opportunities and achieve better results. This has resulted that performance appraisal in many organizations takes up capacity and time. This was the starting point of our interest to study whether the time spent on performance appraisals effectively pays for itself in the organization, in other words whether the effects expected actually are achieved. The paper examines first line managers` views on staff appraisal purposes and effects of a function within the Landstinget. The survey design, methodology and transaction are of qualitative and quantitative method with three different sources: literature review of previous research, interviews with first line managers in Landstinget Västmanland and the results from an employee satisfaction survey conducted on behalf of Landstinget Västmanland.

A conference is not only a meeting but an experience as well. The purpose of this study was to analyze and evaluate four conference organizers within the area of Stockholm Sweden, and to identify their range of activities. Studies were made regarding these conference organizers and how they cooperate with other companies to offer a wider aspect of range. The purpose was also to find out how the demand side of the market appears. The demand side of the market could give an implication of how the conference organizers appear from their perspective and how the conference organizers adjust to their demand.