Purpose:The purpose of this study is to improve the knowledge regarding how entrepreneurial companies act and behave in relation to human capital, by studying their decision-making process for human capital investments. Furthermore this study shall enrich the understandings for how their way of handling human capital investments might change over time along with the development, growth and aging of the company.Methodology:For this case study the authors have chosen a qualitative approach. The authors have collected the empirical data by interviewing the CEO?s of six different entrepreneurial companies. To be able to process and analyze the empirical data the authors have used various theoretical frameworks and also previous studies.Theoretical framework:The theoretical framework brings up human capital and its importance, but also its role in the entrepreneurial company.

With the globalization, companies in the West chose to shift production to developing countries to cut down costs. This had a major impact when child labor and very poor working conditions in these factories were discovered and led many companies to take responsibility for their suppliers and the employees by adopting voluntary so-called Codes of Conduct.There is a subtle balance to enforce improvement of working conditions for employees at suppliers´ factories and to keep costs down. On the one hand, companies would like to conduct extensive audits at their suppliers to ensure code of conduct compliance and thus protect their legitimacy. On the other hand, audits are expensive so companies would like to minimize audits to keep costs down. Companies thus have to strike a delicate balance in relation to how many and what suppliers they choose to audit.

Sammanfattning Titel: Lågkonjunktur ? En studie i vilka skillnader som finns för variationen i antal anställda inom IT- respektive industribranschen Författare: Emilio Nilsson, Oscar Kacprzak Handledare: Emil Numminen Institution: Blekinge Tekniska Högskola Kurs: Kandidatarbete i Företagsekonomi Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka och analysera för hur företagets ekonomiska data för den relativt unga IT-sektorn förklarar antal anställda gentemot hur företagets ekonomiska data förklarar nyckeltalet för en äldre mer erfaren bransch som industrisektorn. Metod: Vi har samlat ihop kvartalsrapporter från 1999 års första kvartal till 2009 års första kvartal för totalt 10 stycken företag som vi bedömt lämpliga för studien, 5 företag från IT-branschen samt 5 företag från industribranschen. Vi har därefter fört regressionsanalyser med antal anställda som Y-variabel och totala intäkter, aktienivå, rörelsekostnader samt rörelseresultat som X-variabler för att finna korrelationen däremellan. Slutsats: De framkomna resultaten från regressionsanalyserna pekar på att det finns skillnader branscherna emellan.

The purpose of thesis was to investigate and compare how two companies within pharmaceutical industry and nuclear power industry are currently working with quality development regarding continuous improvement and Lessons Learned in business processes. In addition, a simple comparison was made with the automotiveindustry.McNeil AB are improving their processes continuously and are according to the findings of this report performing well in their pursuit of world-class pharmaceutical production. They have a well functioning process regarding improvements proposed in weekly improvement meetings engaging all employees. However, during interviews it was made clear that the functionality of the process which administer improvement proposals generated in addition to, or beside the weekly improvement meetings, were inadequate. McNeil AB is proposed to administer this through an IT solution instead of by paper and e-mail, that simplifies the process of adding, implementing and follow up an improvement proposal.The nuclear power plant Ringhals AB recently made major improvements in their business processes as well as the plant itself.

Turistiskt kulturutövande ? en studie om autentiska kulturarv fiktiva kontexter i Skara och Skottland, är en magisteruppsats som studerar ett fenomen kallat för ?fiktiva kulturarv?. Två fallstudier, ?Arnfenomenet? och ?Da Vinci- effekten?, analyseras utifrån uppkomst, kulturturistisk form och marknadsföring. Turistiskt kulturutövande har allt mer börjat innebära samarbetsprojekt mellan kultursektorn och turismnäringen vilket fört med sig både positiva och negativa reaktioner.

Titel Lojalitet ? Är det möjligt att bibehålla vid en outsourcing? Författare Joacim Carlsson och Fredrik Thanche Handledare Marie Aurell Institution Managementhögskolan vid Blekinge tekniska högskola Kurs Kandidatuppsats i företagsekonomi, 10p Syfte Vi avser i vår uppsats att undersöka vad som påverkar lojaliteten vid en outsourcingprocess. Utifrån hur företagets agerande påverkar personalen avser vi också att ge förslag på vad man ska tänka på som outsourcande företag och hur man kan arbeta med att bibehålla lojalitet vid en outsourcing. Metod Undersökningen har ett kvalitativt upplägg. Vi har undersökt två företag som outsourcat någon del av företaget för två till tre år sedan.

The purpose of this essay is to examine how gender equality can be used in the workplace, its possible effects, and what collaboration can contribute to the subject of gender equality. A combination of legal sociological and legal dogmatic methodology has been used to examine the EU and Swedish law, how equality should be approached and what previous studies have concluded. An interview has been conducted to provide a clearer picture of how gender equality appears in practice, in the modern workplace. An equality plan should be conducted every three years and applies to employers who are responsible for more than 25 employees. The manual should include a description of the measures considered necessary in the workplace in order to promote gender equality. How an equality plan should be developed is not specifically outlined in the current law, and thus this is left up to the employer to determine.

Thesis purpose: This thesis will through a case study of a recently rebranded bank ?Jyske Bank?, seek to research deeper within the field of service sector rebranding. The internal communication used in connection to the rebranding, will be analyzed in order to investigate what initiatives Jyske Bank?s organizational leaders launched to implement the rebranding and furthermore whether the initiatives have worked. The research questions are: - What are the critical initiatives behind the re-branding process, and have these initiatives been successful?- Furthermore, to determine the success: To what extend does the intended image, created by the organizational leaders of Jyske bank, in relation to the rebranding, correlate with the identity held by the organizational members? Methodology: This thesis employs a mix of quantitative questionnaires and qualitative semi structured interviews.Theoretical perspectives: Corporate rebranding framework (Daly & Moloney, 2004) and a conceptualization of the employee branding process (Miles & Mangold, 2005)Empirical data: The empirical data was collected from in depth interviews with management and questionnaires from employees.

The scarcity of qualified forest machine operators as well as the increased competition for competent machine operators among others from the mining industry in Norrland, were the reasons to investigate what attracts and what deters active and potential forest machine operators to the occupation. An interview study was conducted among four groups with four persons in each group. The groups were students in year 1 and 3 respectively at a forestry school at upper secondary school level as well as employees of a forest company and employees of contractors. The majority of all respondents were of the opinion that their interests in machines had been important for the choice of occupation. But for the active machine operators both the interest in the forest and their interest for machines have had importance for choosing this occupation.

With the globalization, companies in the West chose to shift production to developing countries to cut down costs. This had a major impact when child labor and very poor working conditions in these factories were discovered and led many companies to take responsibility for their suppliers and the employees by adopting voluntary so-called Codes of Conduct.There is a subtle balance to enforce improvement of working conditions for employees at suppliers´ factories and to keep costs down. On the one hand, companies would like to conduct extensive audits at their suppliers to ensure code of conduct compliance and thus protect their legitimacy. On the other hand, audits are expensive so companies would like to minimize audits to keep costs down. Companies thus have to strike a delicate balance in relation to how many and what suppliers they choose to audit.

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the implications and challenges of intercultural communication. An in-depth study was performed of the perspectives from people who work within an international organization. How they experience cultural differences and how they handle them, in particular when it comes to communication. Also, their perceptions of communicative competence were explored. The study was carried out at Svalorna India Bangladesh, at the Swedish office in Lund.

AbstractIn this study, then collaboration agreement impact of the work on 11 and 19 § § MBL are studied. The employer and collective agreements bearing employee union are often involved in collaborative agreements to facilitate cooperation between them. Issues addressed to collaboration areoften questions related to employee participation. The purpose of this study is to investigate two local employers and related collective bearing employee unionsview of the cooperation agreement related to the MBL. The purpose leads to these questions:?How can co-operation agreements affect 11 and 19 § § MBL??What are theadvantages and disadvantages cooperation agreementscan lead to, regardingemployer disclosure and negotiation duty?To try to sort out these issues are interviews conducted to create a greater understanding of the work of the Cooperation Agreement between organizations and how it affects them.Results of the study suggest that collaboration agreement leads to simplifications in the work of the employer's information and bargaining duty.

The collective agreement contains many important provisions concerning the relationship between employers and employees. When a collective agreement applies in the workplace, both employers and employees are bound by it. However, only employers of those two, can take part in the collective agreement, and therefore negotiate the content of it.The purpose of this study is to answer the following question: Why are rules that has been interpreted in collective agreements not expressed in writing? Therefore, the Swedish collective agreement system will be examined, and a distinction between types of silent regulations will be made to find causes. The potential for workers to act on a collective agreement with quiet regulations will also be examined.Collective agreements are signed on three levels: central, union and local levels.

Our purpose in this paper is to examine if there is any profitability for a company with a factory in the timber industry to invest in a combined heat and power, CHP. Based on analysis and the results that the paper generates, we will give Derome AB a suggestion on how it is a profitable investment or not to installing in a CHP.By investing in a CHP plant, you can get a high efficiency, which means that companies can use their resources more effectively. The Swedish wood industry has by-products of production that can be used for combustion in their boiler which is an advantage.The essay is a qualitative study where we have a case company, Derome AB. In this company, we interviewed two employees who have knowledge in the study. They have helped us to provide information and data about their business.We chose to use the pay-off- and the net present value method, NPV, to see if there are profitable advantages for the investment.

The purpose of this study is to examine in what way a strong corporate culture can have an effect on the ways that individuals perceive their own identity based on different social aspects, thereby meaning the influence of personalities in relation to the environment. In this essay I have used the theory of employer branding in an analysis of the corporate culture at Ikea Barkarby, with the purpose to answer the following questions: How does the relation between the employee and the corporate culture appear from an identity perspective, i.e can an individual?s identity be affected by the influence of a strong corporate culture? If the corporate culture has an influence on the individual?s identity, what rhetorical tools are part of this? How can the surrounding corporate cultures possibly influence the employee?s process of becoming a part of the corporate culture? The method of research that was used in this study is a framing analysis and a semistructured interview method. In the discussion of the influence of social environment on identity I have used the rhetorical term doxa. The material that was examined was an advertisement for employment from the Ikea Barkarby website as well as the response from my interviews of some of the employees.The result of the analysis shows that it is possible for an individual to negotiate with himself about his identity in relation to the actual situation and environment, meaning a possible transformation of the individual?s behavior in different social contexts, in this example the corporate culture at work.