The profit a company makes is dependant of its employees which means that their competence is important for the company to perform well. The middle manager has a central position in the organization and is expected to take on different roles. This probably puts a lot of demands on the middle managers and their competence. We want to contribute with a comprehension of how learning, competence and needs for competence can look at a middle management level. Furthermore we also want to find out what kind of strategy for competence development the middle managers want the company to use so their competence development can be facilitated.

During the past year it has been made possible to buy back a company?s outstanding stock. This is done in order to change the capital structure towards a situation with less equity. A change in capital structure means a change in the cost of capital for a company and by that a change in the value for the stockholder. This Master Thesis studies the relation between capital structure and business risk.

The main project Dry preservation of food waste from households includes a new technique concerning drying and storage of dried biowaste as well as a study of the sorting of household waste and further usage of the dried biowaste. A question asked in the project is, can the dried biowaste be used as a soil amendment? If organic waste is used as a soil amendment, precaution concerning hygienic safety risks has to be accounted for. The objective of this M. Sc.

Dagens trend av industriell tillverkning och konsumtion är av linjär karaktär. Material utvinns, blir produkter och hamnar sedan på deponi. Detta examensarbete har tillsammans med Industrial Development Center AB syftat till att skapa en mer hållbar industriell tillverkning inom Skaraborgsregionen, genom att forma en produktutvecklingsprocess i enlighet med cirkulär ekonomi. Cirkulär ekonomi förespråkar att avfall inte får förekomma och att produkter och material ska cirkulera i kretslopp. Projektet bestod därför av en bred förstudie för att samla och utvärdera ett stort område med teorier, processer och företagens ansvarsroller.

This paper contains an analysis that sets out to investigate how sustainable development is portrayed in textbooks used in gymnasium level civics education. The study covers three textbooks, all in current use. The paper sets out to explore the relationship between the books chapters on economics and those about environmental issues. The sum of these two parts is in the context supposed to make up the books big picture of green sustainable development, i.e. the ecological aspect of sustainable development. An analytical model will be used to categorise and compare the three textbooks.The method chosen for this is analysis of ideas by use of ideal types.

This essay discusses the legal and economic functions of the trademark and furthermore the degeneration of trademarks. These two concepts are strongly connected as the primary function of the trademark is the ability to separate the proprietor of the trademark?s product from the competitors´ products. The ability to separate is the basic condition for receiving legal protection. Through degeneration the trademark loses this ability to separate the product and becomes a generic term for the category of the product.

This study was carried out at Luftfartsverket (LFV Group, SwedishAirports and Air Navigation Services), AstraZeneca and Svenska Spel. The purpose of the study was to examine and compare how these companies work towards becoming, and maintaining to be, an employer of choice. Facts were sought about the companies and their work to become an employer of choice.To get a discerning and profound picture, a qualitative method with semi-structured interviews with twelve key persons in this work was conducted. The method Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was used for analysis.The results showed that an amount of factors have an input on how attractive the employer is. Common were compensation and benefits, competence development, leadership, information and health-related activities.

Partnering is a new and exciting way of cooperation in the Swedish construction industry. In countries like Denmark and the United Kingdom the concept has been developed during a number of years while the Swedish construction industry has been more reluctant.Partnering is seen by many as the solution to the problems that often occur in design and build contracts. Many others believe that it is a way for the big entrepreneurs to gain unfair advantage. Never the less the concept is fast getting more and more appreciation, especially in the region of Karlstad where many new buildings are built that way.We have focused on the new development of Carlstad Conference Center (CCC) which is currently built with a partnering concept. The main method that have been used in this thesis are interviews with personnel on different positions in the project.

The research done in the field of product completeness/incompleteness is limited. The lack of research causes a knowledge gap in the retailing industry, concerning the actual effects on consumer choice, as well as on the overall store evaluation. This report tests the current theories of the subject, and also further aim to explore the effects of completeness/incompleteness on consumer's product choice. The results display an inconsistent effect on consumer's product choice when the completeness/incompleteness in a grocery store is tested. Some products benefit by being incomplete, while others show no such effect.

This thesis describes the work process and the results for the development of a newkind of ergonomic cleaning mop, ranging from basic concept to a virtually productionready digital prototype. The project was made in cooperation with, Ömer Altun, whowas also the project supervisor, and whose plan it is to launch this new product onthe market in a foreseeable future. The mop is meant to be used by both professionalcleaning staff and ordinary home users. What makes this product unique is that it hasa movable center piece that simplifies the cleaning under low furniture.The work began with the establishment of a product requirements specification andlater a study of similar products and existing functional models was conducted. Afterthese surveys the work began with refining the existing concepts in order to makethem more complete.

Processen vid framtagandet av en ny produkt kallas New product development (NPD). Denna process innehåller 6 steg som ska hjälpa företaget vid utvecklingen av en ny produkt. Det andra steget i denna process är konceptutveckling. Utvecklingen av ett koncept är en lång process som innehåller 7 steg som ska hjälpa företaget utveckla koncept till olika produkter. Processen sträcker sig från upptäckt av marknadsmöjlighet till projektplanering.

The thesis work has been carried out at Volvo Aero Corporation (VAC) in Trollhättan. VAC has entered a partnership as developing and producing partner with engine manufacturer Pratt & Whitney and is currently at the starting phase of producing the turbine rear frame (TEC) to the engine PW1000.The purpose of this study was to create a report on process level that describes the conditions and the potential with PW1000 TEC to reach the product cost calculation taking into account lead times and describe alternative method solutions.The report describes a comparison between the present flow (2012), a flow based on product cost calculation (2016) and a potential flow (2016). The work has mainly been based on acquiring the knowledge and information available to inspect the present flow; this has been done by workshop observations, meetings and gathering of the information that is available on the work site for the PW1000 TEC.The information obtained has been merged into an Excel document, called Roadmap. It serves as a roadmap with current situation as the start and the potential flow for 2016 as the goal. With the roadmap as a tool, assumptions have been taken considering the flow and how it will change, where processes have been eliminated, reduced or marked as a problem..

This essay notice film and TV-series as a resource, which can be utililized by the tourism industry. To be more concrete, the aim of this essay is to examine if and how the Television series ?Midsomer murders? can be utilized as a tourism product. To fulfill the purpose of this essay, two different methods have been used: the study off literature and a content analyses, the later in form of a picture & film analyses. The results of this study showed that ?Midsomer murders? have qualifications enough to be a successful tourism product.

Purpose: Reading aloud to children and having a conversation about a book, which is read to them, has attracted much attention as important factors that influence children's language development. Language development for children is one of the most important tasks that the preschool- teachers have, and according to ?Läroplanet?, all children must have the opportunity to develop their language. The aim of this study was to examine how reading aloud, and by letting them speak about a certain book, ?boksamtal? impacts preschool-children`s ability to develop their language according to preschool- teachers.Method: I have used a qualitative method by interviewing four preschool- teachers.

By using modern methods of casting concrete, cast in place can get more effective and industrialized. A modern method is self compacting concrete. By using this type of concrete, advantages like improved working environment and rationalized construction can be reached. Because the concrete doesn?t need to be vibrated, the amount of staff on site and the noise can be reduced.