Human capital is professional service firms' most valuable resource and its quality is closely linked to the quality of its services. The purpose of this study is to investigate how professional service firms appraise their employees. A comparative study between an architecture firm and a management consulting firm is conducted with the aim to identify and explain similarities and differences in performance appraisal. Two qualitative case studies are performed and interviews as well as documents are used to explore the area. The thesis builds on a critical perspective and it has an explorative approach.

The sun is essential to life on earth and no matter where you are, there is a constant need ofenergy. Nearly 800 000 years ago man learned for the first time to use fire in a controlled way.Since then, fire has given us the opportunity to inhabit places despite a cold climate. In Swedenthe resident sector accounts for a major part of the total consumption of energy. In a time whenenvironmental issues and greenhouse effects are increasing, we also see a future of rising energyprices. With this perspective, we have in this bachelor thesis in the Building Environment at theRoyal Institute of Technology, KTH, in Stockholm decided to focus on the renewable energysource, solar energy.The energy from solar radiation is a free resource and does not have any negative effects uponthe environment.

The purpose of this study is to examine the information seeking behaviour among unestablished archaeologists. Special attention has been directed to the areas of informal communication and the development of personal networks. As a former archaeology student I have been able to apply my previously acquired knowledge when writing this thesis. The empirical study is based on nine interviews with archaeologists each with more than one and less than four years of professional experience. They all have various experience of working as a fieldarchaeologist and five have simultaneously worked as university researchers.

Organizations that want to maintain a good innovation capability can seek knowledge both within and outside its boundaries. Opening up innovation processes, through so-called open innovation, allows organizations to combine internal and external knowledge sources in order to include previously excluded perspectives to the innovation process. This study examines how knowledge is created and transferred when conducting open innovation through crowdsourcing. It is done based on Nonaka?s (1991; 1994) theory of how knowledge is created through conversion processes, where implicit knowledge can be converted into explicit knowledge and vice versa.

Today?s society has become more and more digitalized and we have access to more information than ever before. This has had a major impact on organizations and their work processes. For example have intranets become a common technical groupware to communicate and get relevant information from inside the organization. A common problem related to this is an over-reliance on the technology, where there's not taking into account that some informal and communicative means are difficult to occur through digital resources.The aim of this study is to examine the use of an intranet in a municipality, which consists of many different employees with various work situations.

The ?civilized? world is in need of fossil fuel in order to function. Hybricon AB is a company in Umeå that is developing a technology that hopefully can reduce parts of this need. They are currently testing their two electrical busses (with Hybrid backup) in city traffic on the roads of Umeå in cooperation with the county of Umeå.                               The busses are originally diesel-busses, but the diesel motor has been replaced with two electrical hub-motors with a power of 145 kW each that are powered by batteries.The batteries are charged at the end station after each route. In case the batteries should run low on capacity during driving, they can be recharged by the so called genset.

As the Swedish governments long term goals include a reduction of fossil fuel dependency, increasing pressure is placed upon energy companies to create and develop new solutions for renewable energy. The following case study was done in collaboration with the company Sydved Energileveranser AB and one of their contractors, Enarssons Skogsentreprenad AB. The objective of the study is to examine the bioenergy situation in region of Skåne and evaluate the potential solutions in the region for a forest-fuel assortment, based on a bioenergy-cutting-system. As a part of this study I have compared ordinary manual cuttings done with a chain saw and cuttings made using the new ?bio- energy cutting system?. The cuttings made under both systems were tested in areas near agricultural fields or pasture land in order to maintain an open landscape.

Blekinge Hospital suffers from a budget shortage of 100 million SEK, while the government now requires that hospitals will no longer be running a deficit. Blekinge Hospital will then use their limited resources to survive in the future and the activity must be enhanced in order to keep costs low without having to lay off personnel. The idea is that the organisation should be more efficient with a more efficient resource usage. Performance measurement systems are important tools for achieving the policies set out within an organization, measuring and evaluating performance is a way to see where improvements in efficiency may be necessary in the business. Balanced Scorecard (BSC) is one of several measuring systems, where the focus is on measuring non-financial performances.

The aim of this study in social work was to investigate, describe and analyze six Swedish men?s description and experiences of relationships with bargirls in Thailand, whom the men initially paid for sexual services. We also aim to find out how these men look upon prostitu-tion, masculinity and gender and we analyze these themes in relation to the men?s description of their relationships. The theoretical approach was social constructivist theories of masculini-ty in combination with gender theory.

The Main problem: How small-sized manufacturing companies can create and sustain a stable position in the industry, which leads to profitability.Purpose: The purpose with this essay is to compare two small-sized manufacturing companies, Datek Industrielektronik AB and AB Micatrone to study which strategical resources each company possesses. At the same time analyse if the strategical resources are to be consider as sustainable competitive advantage.Method: A case study has been implemented in two small-sized manufacturing companies. The collected primary data derives from semi-structured interviews.Theoretical framework: The theoretical framework is based on The Resource-based view where the independent variables are the VRIO-model, resource tree and external resources. The dependable variable is sustainable competitive advantage.Empirical foundation: The empirical foundation is based on the compilation of the few conducted interviews with Datek and Micatrone.Results & Conclusion: Datek and Micatrone show both similarities and differences in what creates their sustainable competitive advantage. The management of both companies creates according to the VRIO-model sustainable competitive advantage.

Syftet med uppsatsen a?r att skapa fo?rsta?else fo?r om och hur humankapital pa?verkar va?rderingen av kunskapsfo?retag vid fo?retagsfo?rva?rv. Vidare vill vi underso?ka vilka faktorer som styr humankapitalets va?rde.Va?r teoretiska referensram grundar sig i teori om kunskapsfo?retag, fo?rva?rv och va?rdering. Vi tittar a?ven na?rmare pa? Due Diligence och Human Resource Due Diligence som a?r tva? typer av fo?retagsbesiktningar.

Statistik visar att så mycket som 20 procent av alla trafikolyckor involverar någon form av förardistraktion. Samtidigt finns det ingenting som indikerar att sekundäruppgiftsutförande under bilkörning minskar. För att få ökad förståelse för förares beteende genomfördes detta examensarbete med syfte att studera förhållandet mellan upplevd mental belastning och faktisk påverkan på körprestationen vid utförande av sekundäruppgift under bilkörning. För att besvara syftet genomfördes en litteraturstudie. Analysen av inkluderade artiklar och deras respektive sekundäruppgifter baserades på Multiple Resource Theory.

Sammanfattning Titel: Förvaltning i förändring - en studie i hur ett fastighetsföretag arbetar kundfokuserat Ämne/Kurs: Fastighetsvetenskap, 10 poäng, FF7630 Författare: Anna Alvemo & Kristina Holm Handledare: Anna von Krusenstjerna & Karin Staffansson Pauli Nyckelord: Fastighetsvetenskap, Kundvård, Service management, Human resource management, Företagskultur. Bakgrund: Vart eftersom utbudet på lokaler de senaste åren har ökat, har fastighetsföretagen börjat konkurrera om hyresgästerna. Förändringen på marknaden har lett till att fastighetsförvaltning gått ifrån att enbart fokuseras på fastighetens driftkostnader till att bli allt mer kundfokuserad. Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att beskriva hur Aspholmen Fastigheter AB anpassat sig till de nya kraven på fastighetsmarknaden. Det sker genom att fördjupa sig i hur de tre lokalkontoren arbetar för att stärka sina kundrelationer samt att åskådliggöra hur företagskulturen ser ut. Metod: Undersökningen är en beskrivande studie som utgår från en kvalitativ metod. Det empiriska materialet är till största del inhämtat via personliga intervjuer med personal och ledning på företaget. Det teoretiska materialet består av sekundärdata och är hämtad ur litteratur och rapporter. Teoretiska perspektiv: Kapitlet inleds med en generell presentation av lokalhyresmarknaden.

Changes in the environment are affecting the world market, and pressures from several stakeholders? are forcing different enterprises to adjust to the current situation. Farmers? difficult working conditions and environmental impacts of the conventional cotton production in India have been highlighted. The small-scale production that is characterising India?s cotton farmers implies an insufficient competition power.

The purpose of this Master?s thesis is to examine the accessibility and barriers of public libraries to intellectual and mentally disabled children and young people. This we will do by examining whether the library staff acts according to policies of the libraries. Our method has been qualitative interviews with library staff and we have also observed the environment, media and marketing of these libraries. As a theoretical starting point of the analysis we use Michael Buckland?s different aspects of access to information.