Recent years have been very turbulent for most private equity firms. Especially the financial meltdown in global economy has affected the industry, but also the public pressure has made private equity houses change their control strategies towards more conventional methods used in public companies. This thesis aims to put light on the control methods used in listed private equity houses which use a buyout strategy. The paper describes how the control methods change over the different phases the asset experience and how different value generating strategies use altered control methods. Using Merchant's (2003) framework for management control systems and Berg and Gottschalg's (2004) research on value generating strategies in buyouts the thesis shows that action controls as designing instructions for the board and a business plan, together with goal alignment is the commonly used control strategy directly after the acquisition.

The purpose of this essay is to examine how four Swedish retail companies describe their information management in connection to ethical trade. My purpose is also to examine how this information management relates to organizational learning. My questions at issue are ? ?Which activities related to information management in connection to ethical trade is described by the companies?? and ?How can these activities and statements be related to organizational learning?? My method of investigation is to perform qualitative interviews with representatives from the retail companies and relate the results to theories on information management and organizational learning, mainly theories of double-loop- and single-loop learning. The information management literature address issues such as information needs, information sources and information seeking.

The title, ?You simply must own your classroom?, is taken from a quote from one of my informants.After review of earlier research on how teachers handle their leadership in the meeting with disturbing pupils and which strategies they use to solve problems in the classroom, interesting questions developed. What experiences do teachers have of disturbing situations in the classroom? Which strategies do they use to solve the problems? What kind of support do the teachers consider necessary in teaching? Are there any differences in teachers? experiences and strategies between the two selected schools? The study is supported by earlier research that deals with pupils? and teachers? perspective and strategies in different classroom cultures in terms of norm-breaking behaviour of pupils. The study is also supported by three different theoretical perspectives such as power structure, social order/disorder and support strategies.I conducted the study through interviews with sex teachers who work in the same municipality but in two separate schools.

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate 7 different search strategies for content-based image retrieval with respect to retrieval effectiveness. The strategies are based on different levels of resolution implemented by the Haar transformation. The result of the study shows an improvement in both mean average precision and mean recall in strategies based on lower levels of resolution..

The purpose of this study was to get an idea of ??how the leaders in the real estate industry perceive and manage boundless working conditions. Questions that were answered were how the leaders in the service influence and control the employees' working conditions. Also how the communication strategies are designed to facilitate the work towards common goals, when tasks are not limited to the workplace. The study examine if boundless working conditions is characterized by unspoken expectations.

The aim of this study is to investigate which management control mechanisms evolve in companies that receive funding from Venture Capital companies and why the management control systems evolve in the way that they do. A case study was performed on three Swedish high technology companies, that all received funding from Venture Capital companies for the first time in 2006. Merchant?s framework, defining all management control mechanisms as either, results control, action control or personnel control, was used to structure the study. Results show that the companies that received Venture Capital all increased the use of management control mechanisms within results control, action control and personnel control.

The aim of this study was to investigate what formative assessment means and get information about how teachers? assessment practice in formative assessment can look like, based on five key strategies. I have observed five teachers in grade 4 to 6 during a week of their mathematics teaching. Formative assessment is assessment for learning and has the purpose to support students? knowledge development.

The purpose of this study is to increase the understanding of how venture capitalists can use their network in order to reduce information asymmetries between themselves and the venture management team. A qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews, consisting of open questions, have been used to receive gradate information in order to reach our explorative purpose. Our theoretical framework consists of relevant studies made on the dynamics of networks and the problems that can arise in the complex relationship between a principal and an agent. We have been interviewing two venture capital firms and therepresentatives from two business angel networks. We also made an additional interview with an influential financial actor in order to try to verify our conclusions Our conclusions are that an extensive network can be used by venture capitalists in order to; verify ventures? technologies, complement the competences in the venture management team, and arrange co-investments, resulting in reduced information asymmetries between themselves and the venture management team.

The study has shown that retailers in the mid-price segment differentiate their brand through developing a strong company identity around the brand. The personality involves store atmosphere, merchandise and advertising. Larger companies have chosen to lay the responsibility on management level, which facilitates on store level. By controlling the strategies on a central level the company can make sure that the stores are steered in the direction that the company wants them to be steered in, and also that they follow the positioning-concept. The company can also devote its efforts to working with its core value, which is service.

Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka vilka effekter två olika läsförståelsemodeller, Reciprocal Teaching och Transactional Strategies Instruction, har på elevers läsförståelse. Den metod som användes i studien var kvalitativ textanalys som applicerades på 7 forskningsartiklar. Resultatet visar att modellerna gett effekt, i olika åldrar, länder och grupper. Detta resultat visar att Reciprocal Teaching och Transactional Strategies Instruction är effektiva modeller att arbeta med för läsförståelseutveckling..

Asset management in insurance companies differs from conventional asset management to the extent that respect has to be taken to both assets and the commitments the insurance company has towards its customers. A model that has proven to fit well regarding the matching of assets and liabilities is the Asset Liability Management Model (ALM model). In addition to the matching in the balance sheet, the ALM model can be used in a company's work with strategic portfolio allocation by applying it as a basis for analyzing investment strategies with expected risk and return. From this, the ALM model also becomes relevant for calculating key figures according to the legal framework Solvens II which includes laws and regulations regarding the demands on economical strength (solvens) of insurance companies.Hence, the goal of this masters thesis has been to, on behalf of Bliwa Livförsäkring, create an ALM model to support the asset management department of Bliwa in their work with defining a credible way of analyzing the future risk and return of Bliwa's asset portfolio and insurance undertakings.The ALM model generally consist of four submodels, the scenario model, the liability model, the asset model and the company model, where the scenario model often is named as the core of the ALM model. The course of action has been to develop these submodels individually, with focus on the scenario model.

A performance measurement system can be used as a means to evaluate past performances and to communicate prioritizations. It has also been proposed that a performance measurement system can serve as a method to execute strategies, guide in operational decisions and constitute a tool for making the organization more efficient. Yet one may question if such a system will ever reach this capacity if operating managers do not utilize it as a management tool, but rather treat it as a mere report in the bunch. This paper explores how middle managers in fact apply performance measures and what obstacles there are to integrating them in the management of subunits. Furthermore it serves to investigate whether these managers experience a conflict between how they are expected to use the measures and what they deem possible to adopt.

Trading based on technical analysis has its roots in the U.S. financial industry where it has long been common practice, in Sweden however the trading style has not had the same impact. Based on the results from the preliminary study we believe this is about to change and that the topic therefore requires further studying. Several online stockbrokers today provide information and tools for technical analysis to their clients. As the list of indicators to use for creating strategies is so immense it is interesting for an investor to know what actually could be the basis for a profitable investment strategy.

Species that have a high degree of specialization and poor dispersal ability can be more prone to extinction than more generalist species and good dispersers. How these species traits affect the viability of populations is dependent on landscape factors,such as isolation and connectivity. Additionally, interactions between species (e.g. symbiosis), and how these interactions vary spatially and temporally can have a large impact on populations. When the range and habitat areas of a species continuously decrease, management strategies are often needed if the species shall be able to survive.

The purpose of the study is to examine, describe and analyse how a selection of parents to children with Asperger syndrome understand, experience and cope with their parenthood. To attain this purpose we focused on these following questions;How does the respondents view their parenthood?; What kind of strategies does the respondents use to cope with their parenthood on the basis on their child with Asperger syndrome?; How does the respondents experience the mesosystem interact with them regarding situations contenting strenuous and stress?We chose to do a qualitative study by conducting separate interviews with eight parents to children with Asperger syndrome. Then we analyzed the answers using an abductive research, we tested the empirical data against our choice of theoretical perspectives. The results shows; that several of the parents in the study have experiences of high strenuous and stress in combination the several roles their parenthood contained.