Research question: How does the industrial company Scania work to get more women in leadership positions?Purpose: The purpose of this work is to describe how companies in a male-dominated industry can work to get a higher share of female leaders.Method: This survey was based on a deductive approach with a qualitative method. Theories have been obtained primarily from scientific articles and the empirical part has been collected through interviews from the companies Wiminvest and Scania.Conclusion: The conclusions the study came up with was different elements that companies in male-dominated industries can work with to get a higher share of female leaders. The first thing that companies can do is to join the project BON or similar projects to work on this issue. They can work with workshops and lectures to disseminate knowledge about the topic.

Background: Research results show that the potential of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has increased. That means there is a growing pressure on Swedish companies to act with responsibility: general public has a positive attitude towards companies that communicate their CSR. Advertising agencies have been criticized by their way to manage the question of social responsibility. One of the characteristics of an advertising agency is their anonymity; even though their products are extremely visible, it is rarely clear who gave rise to an advertising production. If this is put in relation to CSR in general, we find ourselves in a contradictory situation when CSR in many cases is about exposure of the responsible corporation.

Internship is a new form of interaction between the academic world and the market and a phenomena increasingly popular among elite universities in Europe. The educational system has traditionally kept an academic approach where the institutions for higher education have acted isolated without extensive influence from the market. Today pressure from the market has led to intensified interaction between the universities and companies among many European elite universities. We have carried out a situational analysis concerning interaction between the academic institutions and companies in Europe. More specifically, we looked at the potential for Stockholm School of Economics (SSE) to strengthen its position on the educational market by adjusting its strategies and implement internships as a part of the education.

Background and problem discussionThe temporary employment industry has grown extensively during the past two decades since the market was deregulated. Companies today need to be flexible to meet fluctuating demand and economic climate in society which has made the market expand. When using employees not directly employed by the company there is a risk that long term effects appears that the companies have not thought of.Aim of studyTo create a model of what negative aspects companies should consider when making the decision to use temporary employees.Methodological frameworkThe study performed through an abdicative literature study and with an empirical data collection method of a qualitative approach where we interviewed five hiring companies and one temporary agency on the decision of hiring temporary employees.Frame of referenceProblem areas with the use of temporary employments were identified through four perspectives of the organization; the structural, human resource, symbolic and political perspective. The problem areas we address are organizational learning, motivation, risk of eroding human capital, belongingness and conflicts. These will be described and presented together with management control to counter the problems.EmpiricsThe empirics are focused on what aspects the companies of the study considered when making the decision to use temporary employment, what the companies? different reasons for using temporary employment are and what they do to minimize possible negative effects.Analysis and conclusionsCompanies use temporary employees mostly to become more flexible, both numerically and in their competence.

AbstractThis master thesis is a hermeneutic inspired case study of how the value base regarding the environmental and social responsibility in the Swedish coffee company Löfbergs Lila AB is affecting the company's business. A thesis inspired by hermeneutics means that it is based on two ideas, the one of interaction between entirety and partitions and the one of interpretation (Alvesson & Sköldberg 1994). This cause that the emphasis is on how the reality is interpreted and that it never can be seen as completely objective.The case study was conducted during the spring semester of 2010 at Karlstad's University and consists of both empirical and theoretical material collected during this time. The empirical material in this thesis includes, among other things, interviews with four representatives of Löfbergs Lila AB, written material from the company regarding its work related to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), some information about the coffee industry as a whole and different certifications for "ethical? coffee that exists on the Swedish market.The basic idea with CSR as a business strategy is that it can be financially beneficial for companies to take a social and environmental responsibility outside of the company (Vogel 2005).

Financial bubbles are characterized by a large increase in the economic growth on the market as a whole or in specific industries. The change gives rise to an increase in the capital needed to finance this growth. Companies typically have a choice between equity and debt capital to finance its business and the mix of these types of capital is often referred to as the company?s capital structure. There has been a lot of research done in the field of financial bubbles and ofcapital structure, as of yet no studies seem to address these two areas in combination.The aim of this study is to examine if financial bubbles affect a company?s capital structure and through this also examine if the supposed changes in capital structure can be generalized.The study comprise of two identical time-series which examines the changes in leverage and the choice of financing during the Swedish real estate bubble in the early nineties and the IT-crash at the end of the 2000th century.

Today, maintenance is a big part of the daily life on board ships. It is also one of the bigger expenses a shipping company has and without any loss of quality tries to run as economically advantageous as possible. In the hunt for economical savings the shore-based industry has subsequently applied the use of condition based maintenance, CBM, were a component is maintained according to its actual state. This leads to a reduction of maintenance costs since no parts are unnecessarily replaced. However, within the maritime sector a periodical maintenance is still the most commonly used maintenance system.The purpose of this paper is to chart the factors that are the reason for the low implementation of CBM on board the Swedish merchant fleet's ships.

The purpose of this work, has been to examine how different actors in the Swedish eco movement and the Swedish forest industry looks at Sweden?s forest policy statement, which claims that environmental goals and production goals should be equal in Swedish forestry. By assembling focusgroups with participants from the Swedish eco movement and the Swedish forest industry, we look at if these participants consider the Swedish forest policy goals equal or not. Conflicts do occur between the two forest policy goals, but also between those and others of Sweden?s environmental goals.

Purpose:The purpose of this thesis is: to determine key success factors for an organisation?s internal process of internalising future trends forecasting. Methodology:A qualitative approach has been chosen by examining three different companies (Electrolux, H&M and, Sony Ericsson) through interviews and other data. The empirical material have been analysed by using valid theory as a platform from where the analysis can be performed. This has created a conceptual analysis that enables the use of the conclusions in other similar companies.

This paper intends to examine the knowledge challenges in small IT companies which is going through rapid growth. The movement of information and knowledge is a social and very complex process. The challenge for technology is the social as information and knowledge requires. To believe blindly that technology will solve the problem is what many people think. In order to understand how technology can support information and knowledge management one needs to understand what information and knowledge is.

AbstractThis thesis explores how secondary schoolteachers in Swedish, prioritise from the Swedish language history materials. The study includes interviews with two Swedish teachers and inquiries with students in two classes at the social science programme (third year). The student literature that is used has been analysed and the teaching is compared with the Swedish central teaching plan. The results show that the students are weak in placing language at different historical time periods and make conclusions of this. The results from both the inquiries and teaching contents disclose a general weakness as it comes to Swedish language history.

Background: Different cultures meet to a greater extent than before as a result of the increasing globalisation. Therefore, international leaders have to count on greater differences in behaviour of their employees within organisations than they have experience from. It can consequently be difficult in an international environment to understand what motivate individuals of a different culture. Purpose: The purpose of this report is to make greater understanding for how national cultures influence leaders methods to motivate their employees in an international environment in Spain where two different cultures confront. Performance: The study has been made by 14 qualitative interviews with Spanish and Swedish leaders in Spain.

Background: The literature concerning M&A has thus far concentrated on the merging companies, and on what kind of effects an acquisition has on these companies. The effects on the involved companies´ (customers and) suppliers have largely been ignored in the M & A literature. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyse how the suppliers relationships to the aquired company are influenced by an acquisition and how the suppliers handle the following situation. Method: The paper has been carried out in the form of a case-study and we have interviewed some suppliers to the automotive industry. Results: The full effect on the suppliers relationships to Volvo has not been seen yet, due to the fact that only two years has passed since the acquisition and that the current products have a lifecycle of 3-5 years.

The report aims to examine how property owners position themselves to reach their targetmarket, and which strategies they use when positioning their product. The investigation has beencarried out mainly in the form of a case study in which a number of interviews with Stockholmreal estate companies has been conducted, focusing on commercial property market segment.The interviews have resulted in identification of common and specific strategies among thecompanies. These strategies have been analyzed in the light of the theory by Philip Kotler andKevin Lane Keller, focusing on how an offer should be designed to reach a competitive position.It can be concluded that positioning is a key activity for successfully addressing the targetmarket. Successful positioning mandates three key requirements to be met; determining thecategory to which the offer belongs, identifying similarities and differences compared to thecompetitors and developing a brand mantra. The result of the case study concludes that theproperty companies work similar in many ways.

Financial bubbles are characterized by a large increase in the economic growth on the market as a whole or in specific industries. The change gives rise to an increase in the capital needed to finance this growth. Companies typically have a choice between equity and debt capital to finance its business and the mix of these types of capital is often referred to as the company?s capital structure. There has been a lot of research done in the field of financial bubbles and ofcapital structure, as of yet no studies seem to address these two areas in combination.The aim of this study is to examine if financial bubbles affect a company?s capital structure and through this also examine if the supposed changes in capital structure can be generalized.The study comprise of two identical time-series which examines the changes in leverage and the choice of financing during the Swedish real estate bubble in the early nineties and the IT-crash at the end of the 2000th century.