This paper analyzes the auditor choices for a sample of 300 predominantly small Swedish firms, all located in Umeå. Our hypothesis was based on the complexity of a firm, the need of external financing, leverage, and the need of extra consultance from the auditfirm. Our definition of auditor quality is based on prior studies, and is frequently used by authors in this area. The assumption is based on that the auditor quality increases with the size of the auditfirm and the degree of the auditor. The auditor quality is therefor depending on the choice between an auditor from the group ?Big 5? or not, and the choice of an auditor with an higher degree.

ALMI Business Partner operating in the years 2008-2010 a project called Vivan which is about innovations made by staff in the health care profession. The project Vivian is to bring new products to the market by establishing new companies. We have looked at why health care professionals to a lesser extent than other professionals choose to start businesses. Another question raised is why it is mostly men who have chosen to start their own business in the female-dominated health profession. Traditionally, men have as an advantage over women in the corporate market in Sweden.

AimThe purpose of this study is to investigate if there is any variance between masculine and feminine physical education teachers leadership.Are men more authoritarian than woman in their education? Do the influence of pupils have something to do with the gender of the teacher?s? Do the pupils respect masculine physical education teachers any different compound to feminine teachers?MethodWe have studied relevant literature that consider masculine and feminine leadership. The choice was to work with senior compulsory school. We choose the community of Botkyrka, through comfort choice. The criterion for the teachers were that they would have a swedish physical education and have been working at least for 4 years.

AbstractAs a developer of database-driven applications you will be faced with difficult choices, when it comes to choosing database, server and programming language. For the result to be satisfactory it requires the different techniques to interact well with each other and also fulfill performance expectations. This is even more important when the application is deployed to the cloud and the response time plays a major role.This paper evaluates different databases and their performance. To test the databases there was an application made in the server script language PHP or Hypertext Preprocessor and it was deployed to Windows Azure cloud platform. The test applications task is to call and load databases by controlled requests which creates, reads, updates and deletes data in an relatively large extent.The results shows that locale databases or databases in the same data center as the server generates the fastest response.

SammanfattningDetta är en teoriutvecklande uppsats som handlar om etnisk mångfald i organisationer. Här ligger fokus på politiker och chefstjänstemän i kulturnämnd/förvaltning i två medelstora kommuner i södra Sverige. Uppsatsen inleds med en debatt om etnisk mångfald. Syftet är att genom kvalitativa intervjuer med politiker och chefstjänstemän dels bidra till att öka förståelsen av begreppet etnisk mångfald samt att dels bidra till teoriutvecklingen rörande etnisk mångfald i organisationer. Teoriutvecklingen vilar på den induktiva metoden och närmare bestämt den Grundade teorin.

The global climate-change means increasing mean-temperature and higher precipitation in Sweden, which leads to shorter periods of frozen ground in the forest. At the same time the harvesting machines are getting bigger and more powerful. The forest industry aim at an even wood flow, and the ground damage has to be as low as possible. The two biggest causes for ground-damage is the bearing capacity of the forest ground and the ground-pressure of the harvesting machines. The aim of this study was to find out some rules for the machine choice considering ground pressure, when harvesting on ground with low bearing capacity.A field study, using a Valmet 890.3 forwarder, was carried out where different ground pressures and their effect on the ground were tested on two different types of ground.Additionally, an inventory of damaged harvesting grounds was made.

Teenagers are the group that spends most money on clothing. When choosing clothes, the so called internal and external signals could affect the perceived quality of the teenagers. The external signals are for example price, brand and place of purchase while the internal signals are the physical composition of the product as for example garment and size. The perceived quality is the attributes that the teenagers perceive that the specific article of clothing has. Today?s marketing, within the fashion line, is mostly to present the design of the product and aim the marketing for curtain segments and to keep a distance to others that are not within the segment group.

The purpose of this essay is to examine why some countries in the world decided to support Kosovo?s declaration of independence in 2008, while others did not. The essay is a type of case study, with Kosovo?s independence as the main focus. For the purpose of the essay, main focus will be on the United States of America, Russia, China and Serbia.

This report shows a qualitative study on how six young adults in the ages between 20-30 who are students at Linnaeus University in Kalmar percieve their news consumption habits and their use of news media on digital platforms. The aim of the study is to examine whether the six students feel the strogest connection with the press where they were raised or where they currently live, why they choose to use the media platforms they do and what meaning the use of the media bare to the students. We have seen a lack of information concerning why young people choose to consume news online instead of in printed media.The study is focused on theories concerning what affects people in their choice of media platforms and channels. This report shows that geographic nature, the quality of the content and which political ideology the daily press is founded on does not affect the respondents choice of media. Our study shows that the most important factor for the respondents is that the platform is easily accesssible and flexible.

Syftet med denna studie var att skapa förståelse kring hur processer kring teori U kan användas för att skapa förutsättningar för en lärande organisation, som präglas av högre effektivitet och kvalitet i dess processer. Undersökningen gjordes i form av en fallstudie på MEKA projektet i Strömsund kommun där projektets nätverksteam intervjuades. MEKA (Mångfald, Egenmakt, Kunskap, Arbete) syftar till att effektivisera och kvalitetssäkra introduktionsprocessen för nyanlända. Detta gjordes för att se på vilket sätt de workshopar som genomförts med nätverksteamet, inspirerade av teori U, hade bidragit till att skapa lärande organisationer. Resultaten visade att workshoparna framgångsrikt använt sig av teori U, vilket skapat mer organisatoriskt lärande hos nätverksteamet.

The Arctic region has not been a topic of discussion or a reason for a conflict in the past, but with the development of environmental issues which has resulted in melting of the ice, so has the interest for the region developed. This has resulted in a conflict over the area, with five countries as main actors. This paper investigates the five main actors? goals with increased influence in the area, using the thoughts of Rational Actor Model, with states as utility-maximizing actors and foreign policy as the expression of national interest. Furthermore the paper investigates the means of getting to the goal, what kind of tools they use.The paper shows that all of the countries are interested in the economically benefits that are buried under the melting ice and the short cuts in sea routes that will be a possibility to use ones the ice melt more.

Syftet med denna studie är utredande och avser att utifrån Shane & Venkataramans teori om idéers uppkomst, MIRPs teori om innovationsprocesser och Sarasvathys teori om causation och effectuation explorativt beskriva och deduktivt tolka innovationsprocesser i Sverige. Problemformuleringen lyder: Hur uppkommer och utvecklas idéer till innovationer i Sverige?Empirin baseras på fyra intervjuer med representanter för fyra olika objekt vilka alla genomgått en innovationsprocess. I resultatdelen beskrivs dessa processer för att sedan analyseras utifrån de tre valda teorierna.Slutsatserna i studien är att innovationsprocesser i Sverige, med varierande avvikelser, uppkommer och utvecklas i enlighet med de tre bakomliggande teorierna..

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explain which factors that affects Swedish listed companies choice of placement for the corporate governance report when the regulation gives different options.Methodology: The chosen research philosophy is positive, research strategy is deductive and methodology is quantitative.Theoretical Perspectives: As support for the dependent (placement) and independent factors agency theory, positive accounting theory, accounting choice, legitimacy-, stakeholder-, and institutional theory are used.                  Empirical foundation:The sample consists of 249 companies. The empirical data consists of the companies Annual reports and Corporate Governance reports for financial year 2011 or when split financial year, 2010/2011. Limitations: A limitation of the study is that it is based on observations from only one year why it is not certain that the results should have been the same if a comparison between several years had been done.Conclusions: The factors size and growth explain the placement of the Corporate Governance Report in Swedish listed companies..

Denna rapport är en konsumentundersökning rörande skivförpackningar. Syftet med undersökning är att ta reda på vad konsumenter har för attityd, tankar och känslor kring olika slags skivförpackningar. Förändringar i människors köpbeteende och den ökad miljömedvetenhet i samhället gör det intressant att undersöka om detta även påverkar konsumenters syn på skivförpackningar. Undersökningen genomfördes genom att tre olika fokusgrupper träffades för att diskutera fyra olika skivförpackningar. I en öppen diskussion fick respondenterna redogöra för sina attityder, tankar och känslor kring skivförpackningar, därefter fick deltagarna svara på mer styrda frågor kring förpackningar och förpackningars miljöpåverkan. I forskningsresultaten framgår det att de flesta respondenter har en positiv attityd till Digipack, som enligt dem har de bästa produktattributen.

Today there are various methods to use when euthanizing horses. Earlier the use of free or captive bullet was the most common method, but in recent decades this has changed and chemical euthanasia is now considered the most common method. The chemical euthanasia has in Sweden been dominated by the use of barbiturates. Somulose® entered the market in the beginning of the 90?s as an alternative to previous chemical euthanasia.