This thesis has two aims: The main purpose is to describe and illustrate how a large Ltd. company can use voluntary redundancy as a tool for restructuring. The additional purpose is to challenge the concept of voluntary redundancy trough outlining alternative ways of reaching the intended achievements of the voluntary redundancy programme. The theoretical framework that has been used primarily contains knowledge assets theories. The chosen theories are intellectual capital and knowledge management theory to approach and analyse the empirical findings.

Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att beskriva och analysera hur två olika organisationer arbetar med strategisk HRM vid högkonjunktur respektive lågkonjunktur.Metod: För att besvara studiens syfte har vi valt att tillämpa en kvalitativ undersökningsmetod. I studien har både primärdata det vill säga intervjuer samt sekundärdata i form av årsredovisningar, årsöversikt, hållbarhetsredovisning och hemsidor använts.Slutsatser: Den första slutsatsen i denna studie är att Coca-Cola Drycker Sverige AB och TV4 AB ser på HRM som mycket betydelsefullt och att medarbetarna är en central tillgång som kan utgöra en konkurrensfördel. Den andra slutsatsen är att Coca-Cola Drycker Sverige AB inte använder olika HR-strategier vid olika konjunkturer. Emellertid upplever vi att de gör små förändringar i sitt HR-arbete i olika konjunkturer men att de ständigt följer de övergripande HR-strategierna. TV4 AB arbetar på olika sätt med HRM vid olika konjunkturer.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the 9/11 attacks, the landscape of the freedom of religion has changed. The issues now facing freedom of religion varies greatly from the issues that the drafters of the universal declaration of human rights faced after World War II.In the light of the new issues that States face in the intersection of religion and societal interest, scholars have criticized the European Court of Human Rights to give too much leeway to the States in determining how the human rights should be implemented, by using the doctrine of margin of appreciation. Critics of the margin of appreciation claim that it is based on culture relativism and that the doctrine undermines the universality of the human rights. In order to decide if the margin of appreciation has indeed led to a relativization of the human rights I compared it to the jurisprudence of the UN Human Rights Committee and its use of the Syracusa principles. My conclusion is that the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights cannot be considered to be based on culture relativism.

The purpose of this study is to identify the points-of-difference that should form the basis for Bryggarsalen?s future marketing efforts. Bryggarsalen is a newly established conference business in Stockholm. To be able to identify these points-of-difference, Bryggarsalen?s marketing problems have been studied from the resource-based view, claiming that the source of sustained competitive advantage derive from a firm?s unique bundle of resources.

Lack of political interest and will to deal with human rights violations carried out under the civil- military dictatorship, has characterized the transition and post-transition in Uruguay. The systematic use of torture, arbitrary imprisonments and forced disappearances in the relatively small country created a culture of fear that has been present through out the post-transition phase. Human rights groups have been central actors in the fight for truth and justice and against impunity. This study analyzes how these groups multiple democracy-building functions have contributed to democratic development. It also analyses how the democracy-building functions have been constrained by the political context.

I följande studie kommer rekryterings- och utvecklingsmetoden Assessment Center (AC) attstuderas. Syftet med studien är att utifrån verksamma organisationers erfarenhet av AC skapa en ökad förståelse för; metodens innebörd, vilka argument som ligger till grund förorganisationers användande av metoden samt dess värde för organisationer. Studien är avkvalitativ karaktär och fokus fästs vid tolkning och förståelse av AC baserat pårespondenternas subjektiva uppfattningar och upplevelser. Studiens teoretiska referensrambehandlar; Human Resource Management, rekrytering, personalekonomi, Talent Management och Assessment Center. Empiri har samlats från sex verksamma organisationer, varav fem organisationer vilka arbetar med AC samt en organisation som har påvisat ett eventuellt intresse av att utveckla ett AC.

Women ledaers and profitability, is there a correlation? Earlier research show different outcome on the correlation between women leaders and profitability. A Swedish consultant firm, Caran has a belief that more women leaders would create more financial profit, we ask us if that is the true situation. Using two different IC measurement methods we have shown the difficulties in calculate intagible resources, which methods that can/ can not be used and if women leders create financial value. We found the women leaders in Caran to add more value per dollar spent on the woman leaders than the value added per dollar spent on men leaders.

Inventory management is a key part of a company?s logistics function and is of great importance to companies as it is a substantial cost. It is of high importance for a company to make sure that the warehouse is efficient as possible. In this thesis two factors that hurt a warehouse?s efficiency are introduced; inventory inaccuracies and lead-time variations.This thesis has been dedicated to analyze how inventory inaccuracies and lead-time variations arise and how to eliminate them.To be able to solve this question we have used a qualitative research method.

Child poverty in Sweden as a social phenomenon has been highlighted in various debates and in poverty research during the recent years. Children's economic vulnerability has gotten more place in research. An interest to highlight child poverty awakened and this study highlights child poverty through a resource perspective among children in preschools. This study aims to examine how preschool teachers perceive the child's assets to various resources as well as how preschool teachers perceive the impact of the preschool where they work on children's access to these resources. The study is qualitative and has used interviews as a tool.

En personalomsättning på 70 procent och en minskning av antalet sökande på 50 procent ledde till att Gröna Lunds arbetsgivarvarumärke ifrågasattes, eftersom ett starkt arbetsgivarvarumärke bidrar till ökad arbetslojalitet samt ökar arbetsgivarens attraktivitet.För att se hur Gröna Lunds Human Resource (HR) avdelning förmedlar arbetsgivarvarumärket internt gentemot säsongsansanställda, genomfördes intervjuer med HR-personal och personer i företagsledning samt bearbetades ett flertal dokument.HR kommunicerade arbetsgivarvarumärket i enlighet med teorier och tidigare forskning, ändå kvarstår problemen. Gröna Lund måste visa ett större engagemang för långsiktiga satsningar på sin personal genom att undersöka möjligheterna till utvecklingssamtal, utbildning och tillsvidareanställningar. Alternativt acceptera sin situation och lägga resurserna på att göra det bästa utav det..

The law firm industry has during the last years met new demanding conditions and one tool to handle these new conditions has been to implement a Knowledge Management system. Large investments have been made in these Knowledge Management systems but the implementations have met many challenges from within the organizations.With a multiple study, based on interviews with Knowledge Management Managers included in a Knowledge Management network, this thesis aims to study the challenges with Knowledge Management and the underlying causes. The result, based on McDermott's theories shows challenges within technical, personal, social and management areas where the law firm need to shift a focus from Information to Knowledge Management, create a culture of trust and integration and use the informal powerbase.The causes for these challenges are found in the base of Mintzbergs theories of Professional bureaucracy where the Knowledge Management is affected by strong self-regulated individualist, a divided organizational structure and industry conditions..

The purpose of this study was to identify the positive and negative aspects of the work and dynamics of a management team and from that recommend how the team can improve. The aim was also to investigate whether there was a gap between how the members of the management team comprehend themselves and how the project, section and team managers comprehend the management team. The management team contains of seven core team members and is the head function of a research and development site in central Sweden. The results are based on interviews with the present members of the management team and three former members, a survey among the project, section and team managers and by participating observation on meetings with the team. The results show that the management team is an overall well-functioning team that with some changes and improvements, especially concerning communication and information, can reach even further.

The purpose of this thesis is to explore the co-creation process and how value is created based on a service orientation using a network perspective. The thesis is studied from a social-constructionist philosophy, using a qualitative approach of data collection and the theoretical framework includes network theories, theories of service-orientation and co-creation. We have conducted semi-structured interviews with a small firm and its network, which consists of a customer, a supplier and a partner. We found that Håkansson?s ARA framework combined with Ballantyne and Varey?s triangulation of value-creating activities help to acquire an understanding of the actors? bonds, the resources? ties and the activity links that exist in a network.

This paper discusses if Margin of Appreciation is compatible with the idea of universal human rights. Through the case of Negative freedom of association in Sweden, it studies the phenomenon that Giorgio Agamben has called the State of exception.The questions that are discussed and answered are 1) How does the rights theories of Jack Donnelly and Ronald Dworkin relate to Margin of appreciation, and 2) How has Margin of appreciation been applied in cases concerning the negative freedom of association in Sweden, in the European court for human rights. These questions and answers are then used in the discussion on how Margin of appreciation affects the concept of universal human rights. .

This essay aims to examine how the synthetic non-human subjects, EDI and Legion, are constituted in terms of their bodies, gender, desire and emotion, in the gaming series Mass Effect. In a close-gaming method I also want to explore in which way the gamer can effect or even change the expressions of the body, gen­der, desire, and emotion made by the synthetic non-human subjects. In order to do this I use Judith Butlers and Sara Ahmeds queer theory, and Donna Haraways cyborg feminism. I concluded that EDI em­braces her embodiments and is given a highly sexualized female body, being more of a woman than a machine. While Legion is rather embracing disembodiment and is given a non sexualized, androgynous male body, be­ing more of a machine than a man.