The main purpose of this Master?s thesis is to do a benchmarking study of the marketing activities at the public library of Valdemarsvik. The purpose is also to describe and get a deeper understanding of benchmarking as a method for improving library activity. Four major problem areas are addressed: How can one use benchmarking as a tool to achieve change? How can one learn with benchmarking? What similarities and differences are there between benchmarking and other similar methods for competence development? Is benchmarking better than other similar methods for competence development? The empirical approach was qualitative and the method chosen was action research.

This study examined if individuals act in a less discriminating way and in a more fair way when they receive instructions about justice and not being discriminating while recruiting. 96 randomly assigned students at the University of Lund participated in this study. The participants were informed that they would act as a recruiter. They would then choose and place three of the best personal record in order of preference. There were three different kinds of company policies/instructions.

There are several methods avaliable to find areas of interest, but most fail at detecting such areas in cluttered scenes. In this paper two methods will be presented and tested in a qualitative perspective. The first is the darg operator, which is used to detect three dimensional convex or concave objects by calculating the derivative of the argument of the gradient in one direction of four rotated versions. The four versions are thereafter added together in their original orientation. A multi scale version is recommended to avoid the problem that the standard deviation of the Gaussians, combined with the derivatives, controls the scale of the object, which is detected.

The aim for this study was to find out what strategies women use to not react against inequality and sexist prejudice. In the study I used a critical realistic approach through, primary, the social ontology presented by Margaret S. Archer. The study focus on both the women?s construction of femininity and their construction of masculinity and what directions it constitutes for the women?s social orientation.

The debate about women and equality is a very burning issue in the Swedish society today. There are a lot of articles, TV-programs, books and web sites treating the position of female leaders today. There are also a lot of myths strongly attached to our minds hindering the equalization process between men and women.The main purpose of our study was to look at women as leaders and identify potential tendencies in businesses sectors dominated by mainly men or women. We also wanted to find out whether leadership behavior is more or less oriented towards relations- or task in any of the chosen sectors. It was even in our interest to see if our chosen respondents supported the myths in our society about male and female qualities.We interviewed 20 women in four different sectors, two dominated by men (Computer/It, Transport) and two dominated by women (School, Healthcare).

Studien processinriktat och resultatinriktat motivationsklimat på svenska och spanska högstadieskolor undersöker skillnader och likheter inom processinriktat och resultatinriktat klimat. I denna studie undersöks det hur dessa två klimat ser ut på svenska och spanska skolor och detta ur svenska och spanska idrottslärares perspektiv. I studien används Nicholls (1989) teori om de två motivationsklimaten. Empirin är inhämtad via semistrukturerade intervjuer med idrottslärare på tre svenska och tre spanska högstadieskolor. Detta i kombination med Nicholls (1989) teori och andra modeller, ligger till grund för den senare gjorda analysen.

The Swedish telecommunication market was prior to the official deregulation 1975 characterized by Telia?s former monopoly position. This thesis studies how the deregulation of the market, and the thereby increasing competition, has affected Telia and how it has influenced Telia?s marketing strategies.The theoretical framework, from which the conclusions will be made, is a combination of the theory about strategic learning behaviours by Slater et al, and Grönroos? theory about a marketing continuum. The empirical work material is the result from two interviews with former key figures at Telia, and a briefing of Telia?s annual report between the years 1993 and 2006.Research findings indicate that Telia has gone from being product oriented with a strong technical focus, to becoming gradually more market oriented with competition orientation but foremost customer orientation as their most distinguished learning behaviours.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the constructions of sexuality, which are produced when judgments concerning asylum are made, based on an asylum seeker?s sexual orientation. The question formulations are the following: Which constructions of sexuality are produced when necessary condition, fear of persecution due to sexual orientation, is applied in judgments regarding refugee status? Furthermore, how constructions of sexuality differ in the judgments where the asylum seeker has been consented and rejected is investigated. The empirical material consists of 13 judgments, which were announced between the years 2009-2013 by the Migration court.

This study aims to investigate how value is constructed in horse business, in order to increase knowledge and contribute to development of theory in this field. This is important since the horse plays a significant role in the rural development in Sweden. The study assumes that value is something created through relationships in the social network. Therefore theories of sensemaking are combined with a discourse analytic method. By interviewing customers to two companies, one with orientation on trotting horses and one with orientation on showjumping horses, it was found that value is constructed through retrospective stories.

Background: As Porter?s diamond (1990) suggested, the business environment highly influences firms? strategies. Today, most of the companies have to decide their strategy depending from a worldwide business environment. Yet, strategy researches and the growing importance of marketing for business success also show that customer dimension must be taken into consideration. On some markets and in certain industries, the offer is much higher than the demand and then, companies need to attract customers.

Studiens syfte var att undersöka handbollsspelares uppfattning om lagsammanhållning, motivation och målsättning. Vidare undersöktes om elithandbollsspelare skildes åt gällande uppfattningar om lagsammanhållning, motivation och målsättning jämfört med icke elithandbollsspelare. Undersökningsdeltagarna var 83 män (M = 20,33 Sd = 3,37) och spelar handboll på elit- respektive icke elitnivå. Studien utfördes med hjälp av frågeformulär (Group Environment Questionnaire, Task and Ego Orientation in Sport Questionnaire och Goal Setting in Sport Questionnaire). Resultaten visade att handbollspelare uppskattar individens attraktion till gruppen som högst, att de är mer uppgiftsmotiverade än resultatmotiverade och främst använde tävlingsmål.

This study aimed at supplementing the Swedish National Agency for Education?s (Skolverket) study (2006) I enlighet med skolans värdegrund? which investigated whether textbooks in various school subjects went against the fundamental values in the curricula Lpf94 and Lpo 94. Due to this study?s supplementing intention, this study uses a similar title as Skolverket. By adding a new subject (Swedish) to Skolverket?s study, this study also strived to show how discrimination might be present in other subjects than the ones Skolverket involved in their study.

The aim of this thesis is to explore possible differences between public and private companies? way to manage projects. In order to analyze the managerial aspects, we have studied the project of a new payment system implemented at the public-transport organization Upplands Lokaltrafik (UL). The project enables mobile payment by text message (SMS). Most theory concerning the management of projects is developed for private companies.

This study examines implementation from national law in to local practice in the district of Kalmar to assure newly arrived immigrants orientation in civics. The study takes its starting point in Lipskys theory about street-level bureaucracy.  Questions that are discussed are about how  the education is understood by refugee?s coordinators, civic communicators and the new immigrates, how the organization has been and what role the demography and economic structures has played for the organization. It is a case study where interviews and enquete has been used.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether there were any differences in how first-line managers within   municipal care   rated their management leadership qualities, and structural empowerment before and after the course in "leadership, learning and improvement". The study had a quasi-experimental design and 64 managers participated. There was a significant improvement in the LaMI factor ?Achievement orientation?, after participation in the course "leadership, learning and improvement". In other factors, there was no significant difference before and after training.