Purpose - To analyze the relationship between supply chain management maturity, supply chain performance and financial performance in small and medium-sized enterprises (SME:s).Design/methodology/approach - The data comprises 15 SME:s that participated in a local logistic study in Gävleborgs län. The levels of supply chain mature within these firms were based upon an interview study and the financial performance of the firms was then examined using financial reports-based data.Findings -The results of this study indicate that there is a strong relationship between SCM maturity and SC performance in SMEs, some relationships between SCM maturity and financial performance, as well as some relationships between SC performance and financial performance. This means that if firms use maturity indicators in the SCOR areas to improve their processes, they will most likely achieve a positive effect on supply chain performance and probably also on financial performance. The result implies that the supply chain maturities in these firms are higher than expected with no one at the adHoc level.While this study is based on a rather small number of participating firms, it would be valuable to further test the significance of the indicated correlations between SCM maturity and performance in a large-scale survey.Research limitations/Implications - The research is an attempt to understand supply chain maturity and it´s implication on financial performance. Developing supply chain maturity is an opportunity for a company to gain superior performance.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine and analyse which effects a service strategy has on the control system of an organisation. The thesis takes a service perspective, and it is assumed that a service strategy gains competitive advantage and that the goal of the service strategy is to increase the customers? satisfaction level. A qualitative in-depth case study was performed on a Swedish beauty company. The organisation?s vertical structure was examined, from central to local level.

Recreation leaders on youth recreation centres is a professional category, mostly mentioned in the public conversation when it comes to taxes and youth problems. But what do they really do, what outlook do they have to their task, and finally, how are their daily lives like at work? The stories of twelve people represent the basis of this essay which itself consists of two separate studies. Six professional recreation leaders speak about their view of their own work, based on background, mission, education, ethics and position. The recreation leaders´stories reflect a worksituation with meetings of great significance andimportant standpoints.

This essay was written in order to elucidate how the priests-to-be and working priests experience the preparation for preaching during their training and if their identity as preachers depends on their preaching; how they refer to rhetoric and what the preparation training looks like.There is no Swedish research within this field, and even the existing international studies concentrate mostly on writing preparation within other occupations, e.g. economics, health care and public sectors. These studies also show that there are several discrepancies between the university preparation for professional writing and speaking and the professional discourse.In order to carry out the investigation the author has interviewed priests-to-be and working priests and examined the syllabi for homiletics and rhetoric. The result of this analysis offers a better insight into the nature of the training in preparing sermons that Swedish priests obtain during their professional education. The author refers to the results of other scientific investigations concerning preparation for professional writing and speaking and concludes that there are similar difficulties within the priest training, e.g.

Purpose: The study aims to, from a companys point of view, describe how strategic work with customer loyalty is done.Conclusion: Another possible way to try to create loyalty is to exceed the expectations whether the customer is a member of the loyalty program or not. A strong brand with a good reputation can also contribute to a stronger loyalty. Reward systems gradually reward the customers since they first need to collect points, or in this case miles, to be able to use them later on. The staff is often educated in service to be able to interact with the customer in a professional manner. One way to interact with the members of the loyalty program is through profiles on the internet.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the determinants of capital structure in Swedish small and medium sized firms. The study includes 24.859 Swedish firms which are further analyzed with regards to their financial characteristics. These characteristics consist of short term debt, long term debt and total leverage. The study compares the relationship between these characteristics and six independent variables.The result shows that profitability is the greatest determinant for capital structure in Swedish small and medium sized firms with regards to total leverage. When profitability increases the total leverage of the firm decreases.

In these days we can witness a growing number of combined school and public libraries in Sweden. It can be explained as an economy measure or as an attempt to develop the library work. The aim of this thesis is to picture how working in combined libraries affects high school librarians? own apprehensions of their professional identity. The results are based on in-depth interviews made with four high school librarians, working not only towards the students but also the public.

This study examines how management consulting firms work with business- and functional strategy and how these strategies are interrelated. More specifically we focus on business strategy (business unit level) and knowledge strategy (functional level) and whether these are aligned or not, i.e. whether strategic congruence exists.A number of recent studies have examined the importance of business strategy and knowledge strategy in management consulting firms separately, but few have pointed out the importance of the alignment between them. With this study we contribute to the strategic field of research with a model that describes how management consulting firms should work with their knowledge strategy given their business strategy. The model is developed through a synthesis between theories in the field of strategic congruence, business- and functional strategies and thereafter tested by an empirical case study of six management consulting firms.

The purpose of this master?s thesis is to study an electronic reference service from a user perspective. By qualitative interviews with eight students the thesis examines their information behaviour, why and when they use the service, the user?s experiences of the service and the communication with the librarian. The users have all used the Swedish electronic reference service Fråga biblioteket ? Forskningsbibliotek.

The success of self-service technology in retail grocery stores cannot be ignored, and the fact is that every other grocery store in Sweden has implemented the self-scanning or self-checkout systems. The trend is that the technique is spreading into other markets with potential to increase productivity for companies and enhance the service for customers. Fast fashion is one branch that is left untouched by the development in payment processes, and despite the leading companies extensive focus on fast service, the concept of self-service technology has not yet been tested. This paper undertake a quantitative, experimental approach to the issue and examines the effect self-checkout would have on Fast fashion- customers. By presenting a scenario with and without self- checkout and afterwards asked about the respondents experience, we can provide the marketing world with new insights.

Statistics Sweden is an administrative agency that delimits built-up areas and produces statistics regarding them. The statistics provide information about the area of the built-up areas, their population number, number of gainfully employees working in the built-up areas, and of buildings. Now Statistics Sweden wishes to extend such statistics by producing a measure regarding how well developed the service is in each built-up area.This study is a contribution to this statistical improvement work and the purpose is to ? by employing geographical information systems and cluster analysis ? classify the Swedish built-up areas according to 1) service width and 2) service degree. A particular built-up area has a high service width if it has many different service functions, such as pharmacies, schools and grocery stores.

Background/Problem: Since the IT-burst in 2000 it has been recession within IT-consultant firms (Sif 2004). The tendency is, however, changing slightly and IT-consultants firms are getting more assignments again (Arbetsmarknadsstyrelsen ? AMS, 2004). IT-consultants firms are however still related to stressed per-sonnel (Handelskammaren 2004; Hallstedt 2001). Another critical factor is the communication between management and workers.

The web is a constantly growing medium that presumably plays an increasing role in public library reference services. In order to provide high quality reference service the librarians need to be able to master this medium. Therefore it is interesting to get an understanding of how librarians actually use the web. The aim of this Master s thesis is to investigate what web search tools are used by public librarians in reference service. Furthermore, the aim is to get an understanding of how the librarians think about those tools and what background factors influence their selection of tools.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to find out how much influence underlying factors have in connection to the internationalization of Born Global firms. Methodology: This study has a qualitative approach in which data is obtained mainly through interviews and secondary data which consists previous theories about the internationalization in small and medium sized firms and recent theories that entitle these firms as Born Global. Conclusion: Based on the existing theories and the qualitative data, we have concluded that the underlying factors for the Born Global firm?s internationalization are abilities and opportunities to create insidership in relevant networks. The most crucial underlying factors for Born Global firm?s internationalization are the ability to create processes to break old patterns of thoughts and the ability to ally with right partners. .

This study examines whether the ownership structure of Swedish firms contributes to explain the variations in executive pay. A regression analysis was performed on 102 companies listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange. The analysis suggests a negative relationship between ownership structure and executive pay after taking company profitability and size into account. The result is in line with previous studies and the agency theory. This indicates that large shareholders have a stronger position in Swedish companies or that large shareholders monitor the management to a larger extent, rather than providing incentives.