In today s society, services are becoming more and more important. They are however, partly because of their immaterial nature, separated from traditional merchandise, why the marketing and producing of them differs. Quality errors in a service are often difficult to discover before the service is brought to a customer, since the producing and consuming of it often takes place simultaneously. Quality errors in a service process are called service failures or in Swedish tjänstefel. Nevertheless, with an effective service recovery process, dissatisfied customers can be turned into satisfied ones.

The market for management consulting services is changing with an increased level of competition and more specialized service providers. At the same time there is a high level of companies that fail in their efforts to establish themselves on the market. This thesis sets out to give the reader an increased understanding of the complex characteristics of the market for these services, focusing more specifically on which factors that have an effect on the strategy development for companies within the industry. The thesis is also aimed at providing the reader with a deeper understanding of how developing consulting companies can tackle the specific challenges facing them. In order to meet the purpose of the thesis, we have applied relevant theories to a generic strategy model in order to develop a model that is applicable for the management consulting industry.

The tourism industry is growing and with its growth competition between destinations rises. In competition, cooperation and collaboration between tourism operators seem beneficial when creating an attractive and dynamic tourist destination.The purpose of this study is to describe and discuss the significance and influence of tourist related networks at a tourist destination, and therefore this study aims to examine the question: What significance do the tourist related networks have at a tourist destination?This study focuses on seven networks on Gotland that are tourism related, and the representatives of the networks were interviewed in order to get their view on the network and its significance to the destination. The study shows that networks have an important role in creating a unified tourist product of the destination, and in reaching out to the potential visitors through joint destination marketing. The study also shows that the tourism related networks helps to improve the reception of the tourist at a destination and to secure the quality of the tourist destination and its tourist products..

Detta arbete har bedrivits i syfte att kartlägga funktionalitet, teknik och användningsområde gällande Web Services. Innehållet utgör således en teoretisk utvärdering av Web Services, samt tester av grundläggande programmeringslösningar. De frågor arbetet ämnar besvara är hur en Web Services på lämpligt sätt kan baseras på en befintlig tjänst, samt på vilket sätt denna Web Services kan göra aktuell tjänst lättare att använda. Dessutom belyses eventuella problem som kan uppstå i samband med denna Web Services-anpassning. I syfte att presentera ett lösningsförslag på ovan nämnda frågor granskades, via en litteraturstudie, ett antal informatikrelaterade begrepp liksom faktorer förknippade med kommersiell verksamhet på Internet.

The aim of this study was to understand how the professional in social work handles the media scrutiny. When the media writes about social services there is seldom anything positive written about it, many social services organizations are instead heavily criticized and scrutinized by the media. When social services organizations are scrutinized by the media there is a crisis at work, and therefore should be handled as a crisis. Therefore, we describe how a crisis management might look like in an organization. The study is qualitative therefore we have interviewed four municipalities in Sweden that have been exposed by the media at a national level.

The purpose of this study was to analyze two local tourism related organizations in Umeå and how they used the marketing method Storytelling. The aim of this study was to examine what kind of stories the tourism related organizations were using, what these stories said in a direct, or in-direct way and how the reception was of the stories and the destinations. A qualitative study in the form of a discourse analysis based on Laclau and Mouffe's view on discourse analysis was conducted. The results of this study shows that storytelling is more effective when it is incorporated in the whole destination/organization when it comes to tourism related organizations and destinations. It also shows that storytelling in itself isn't only an innocent and positive tool and can cause negative feelings if used wrongly for an organization/destination.

The amendment of a law which is expected to come may well have a significant impact on the Swedish real-estate broke market. The law change will probably have an effect in the number of ways real-estate brokers will compete as a result of the increasing variety of services offered. In order to gain competitive advantages brokers must be at the forefront in the development regarding the changing market. To do so requires that the company chooses an appropriate range of peripheral services that are profitable. The problem is to choose the ?right? services to convey. The purpose of this paper is to describe the services that are in demand for transmission and how the agents can work to meet the demand of this new market.

 Inner resistanceThe aim of this study was to investigate the existence of an internal resistance to a work-related change in people who are long-term sick, and if this is related to an identification as ?long-term sick?. A second purpose to the study was to research in which way this internal resistance to a work-related change manifests and point to possible solutions. A qualitative study was conducted with interviews of experts and people on sick leave to illuminate the subject. The main result was divided into interviewed groups.

This report presents the development process of a mobile interface for the C2-monitor. A monitoring tool used to support the operations for the broadcasting services of Ericsson Broadcasting and Media Services (EBMS). With the support of the C2-monitor, operators can monitor hundreds of channels and services produced from EBMS. To enhance a more flexible working environment, the C2-monitor needs to be developed further to support mobile devices with a customized design to take advantage of mobile phones features and functionality. Established and well-recognized design methods and principles have been applied in the development process and user testing have been made iteratively throughout the project.

This study aims to highlight the activities and needs of students in order to explain how mobile services can provide support and facilitate students on a daily basis. The empirical data is based on discussions with a focus group combined with already existing research concerning the areas of mobile service development, contextual-awareness and ubiquitous computing. The results from the focus group show that students have a need for mobile services to help and support them in their ordinary tasks and activities. In the discussion of this report we bring up aspects of development and what to think of when dealing with students..

During the autumn of 2007 I carried out an investigation within the bank and finance Sector. The aim of the investigation was to see how informal aspects could be understood in relation to equality within Bank AB? The main question was: Which are the obstacles and opportunities for equality within Bank AB? To answer the main question I asked the following questions to the material: Are there any gender related different within the organization? How are men and women represented within the internal magazine? Which are the conceptions related to sex/gender within the organization? The investigation is based on a survey, the internal magazine was investigated and finally interviews took place. Throughout the investigation I used organization theory in a gender perspective. With the gender organization theory I examined concepts as structures, leadership, symbolism and changes associated with equality.

PurposeThe purpose of this thesis is to investigate the market of pedagogic consulting and how the customers look upon these kinds of services and what the consultants think about the market. The following five questions were investigated:What is the situation of the market of pedagogic consulting?-          What needs and what demands are there of pedagogical consulting services? -          What are the economic possibilities for schools and municipalities to buy professional development and consulting services?What do schools and municipalities think about their needs and what do they think about buying professional development from consultants?-          How are the professional development offerings of the consultants recieved by schools and municipalities and is there a difference between the private and public sector of education? -          What impact could professional development have on schools?In what way is the marketing for pedagogic consulting done?Method In this study I have chosen to have a qualitative approach with an abductive perpective. I made these choices to get closer to what I wanted to investigate. Through the abductive methodology it was possible to go between theory and empirics.

The purpose of this essay is to explore high school and collage school counselors knowledge and experience of honour related violence and repression. Our study is based on a qualitative method with interviews. The main question in our study is to examine the school counselors education in how to provide support to the exposed adolescents.We have conducted six interviews with school counselors in the southern Sweden. We have used a semi structured interview technique with questionnaires that have been a support to us during the interviews. The results of our study showed that some of our respondents knew that they had limited education and knowledge in honour related violence and also that they wanted more experience about the problemarea.

The purpose of this study was to review a group of youths in a municipality which all had committed criminal acts. The study is based on 66 youths between the ages of 13 and 20 that were all matters for the social services. The social inquiries of the youths where reviewed using a quantitative method. Their backgrounds where examined to identify what type of risk factors they had and what type of crimes they had committed with an aim to detect if there were a relationship between the risk factors and the art of the crime. The result of the study showed that the majority had committed crimes against another person and the risk factors included family related factors and school problems.

This study demonstrates that there is variety of treatment interventions for children exposed to intimate violence. These interventions are differentiated in design but a common ground for them all is that they strive to provide a chance for children exposed to intimate violence, to be able to speak about and process their feelings and violent experiences. The study?s aim is to, with a qualitative approach, seek understanding for the different actors who practice social work, see upon their task in the treatment interventions that are provided for children exposed to intimate partner violence. The study is based on mapping the existing treatment interventions for previously mentioned target group, in Malmö.