In this paper, we argue that incubators facilitate access to external financing for their incubatees. Incubators use a wide range of activities to facilitate the accessing of external financing from public and private sources. We have grouped these into two sets of activities. The general activities aim to develop the conditions for external financing through information, education of incubatees, network-building and lobbying activities. The specific activities aim to assist the individual incubatee in their pursuit of external finance through help in application procedures, establishing need for capital, making contacts with the best public or private investor, etc. Based on the survey data, we have also shown that it is more common for incubatees to attract external capital compared to non-incubator firms. The incubatees seem especially successful in attracting public capital. The incubatees also attract more private external capital, however, the observed frequency of private capital in the incubatees are low.

The aim of this thesis is to discuss and explore the subject of organizing generalists and specialists. The purpose of this thesis is to explore and discuss different alternatives on organizational grouping from a generalists and specialists perspective. It will explore theories around organizational design, different organizational structures and give insight to the specialist and generalist function that can be found in most types of organizations. The aim is to be able to present different aspects of organizing generalists and specialists and to be able to answer the problem question: Is there a best organizational structure for specialist and generalist groups? The study is a qualitative study and the process of induction will be used. The epistemological standpoint is interprevistic and the ontological is more towards constructionism. The methods used are 1) the collection of and qualitative analysis of texts and documents and 2) qualitative semi-structured interviewing. The analysis is based on grounded theory method. The result and conclusions of the study is that generalists most likely do fit better in organizational forms such as simple structure, adhocracy and network organizations. Specialists tend to prefer bureaucracy or functional/unitary organizations. Keywords: generalists, specialists, organization, group structure

This study observes an approach which is known as explorative because it aims to evaluate and examine online media as a tool for e-CRM. In addition, this involves the approach known as iterative also depends on the data, which is qualitative in congestion with observational information. This study builds on the existing literature and theories within customer relationship marketing (CRM). The subfield to CRM, called e-CRM, is further studied the phenomenon of online marketing and online CRM (customer relationship management) in a banking business context. The study builds upon empirical studies of two banks using online banking on a daily basis. The empirical material was collected through face-to-face interviews in order to gain knowledge and understanding of how corporations use e-CRM. Moreover, observations were conducted in order to gain a deeper understanding of how differently e-CRM was used by the two banks, and to see how customers reacted to their initiatives. e-CRM is a new way to interact, it involves rapid interactions that are spread faster and can be visible to anyone using the Internet. It comes along with many challenges as well as great opportunities. It is vital that managers can direct the employees to use online sources and e-CRM in a correct way in accordance with the brand values to avoid contradicting messages. It needs to be used by employees with social competence, as it involves interaction with customers. Organizations need to be involved in e-CRM and online media to be able to influence what people write about the corporation. It is a valuable channel in order to gain customer knowledge and customers' opinions about the business and their offerings. Its also a way to acknowledge complaints and thus be able to handle them. An adequate complaint handling can in turn enhance customer relationships. As e-CRM is a relatively new and constantly evolving phenomenon, it requires curiosity and courage. Further, it can be used to create emotional bonds with customers by providing a personalization.

Title: Potentials of Insurance Market Development in Jizzak region Authors: Shuhrat Abdulaev, Sharof Abdurahmonov Supervisor: Anders Hederstierna Department: Business Administration, Blekinge Technology Institute Course: Master’s thesis in Business Administration, 10 credits Background and Problem Discussion: The main reasons why we have chosen this topic “Potentials of insurance market development in Jizzak region” for our thesis are the followings: 1) Strong and Competitive insurance market is one of the essential parts of well-developed market economy. How to reach well-developed insurance market is a complex problem that the economy of Uzbekistan is facing now. 2) Having studied previous researches regarding insurance market of Uzbekistan and the role of marketing in development of companies we concluded that there are huge potentials for growing in insurance market which have not learned yet. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to find the answers to following questions: How is the current situation in the insurance market of Uzbekistan? What kind of insurance services are there and what is the demand for them? The determination of main clientele of insurance companies; The determination of factors that can affect on insurance services The analysis of proportion of population who do not apply for insurance services and the reasons; The role of marketing research in companies’ growth; Method: This research used Quantitative method. Survey technique used to conduct a quantitative study. Primary data collected through questionnaire. Secondary data collected from banks and department of Statistics of the local government. This research can be seen as deductive research since it begins by examining theories related to insurance and consumer behavior to insurance services. Following hypothesis were developed by the assumption that • Person’s insurance expenditure dependent of their annual income • Person’s positive opinion about insurance dependent of their gender • Person’s positive opinion about insurance dependent of their age • Person’s positive opinion about insurance dependent of their education • Person’s who is insured dependent of their income Theory: The theory section contains a review of theories concerning in economic nature and functions of insurance, marketing in insurance, insurance market in Uzbekistan. Analysis: Statistical program SPSS 14v.(Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) - is used to compute the correlation values and the regression coefficients. The results presented in appropriate table and graph. We divided our analysis into three parts: 1) Using the secondary data, we analyzed accidents that happened during the last two years, obligatory insurance, insurance companies in Jizzak. 2) We analyzed dependence of respondents’ annual insurance expenditure on their annual income using the multiple regression analysis. 3) Based on the primary data and using Chi-square statistical test, we analyzed consumer behavior to insurance service interviewing people individually. Conclusion: Analysis showed that insurance premiums mostly come from obligatory insurance. We discovered that banks are the main clients of insurance agencies at the present and insurance market undeveloped yet, the main reasons are low level of insurance culture, low level of citizens income, lack of understanding by the population and legal entities the need in insurance services; undeveloped economy of country, which doesn’t allow the insurance market to develop as a whole; lack of brokerage companies to work with insurance agencies; lack of skilled specialists and prepared insurance managers.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY TOPIC: Effects of the External Consequences of Organizational Activities on Employee Motivation Fashakin, Teniola Abiodun Odumade, Adebola Oluwatosin SUPERVISOR: Alsen, Göran COURSE: Master Thesis in Business Administration DEPARTMENT: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology, Sweden PROGRAMME: Master of Science in Business Administration PURPOSES: The purposes of our thesis include the following: • To know the activities carried out by organization(s) • To know the external consequences of these activities • To know how these consequences affect employee motivation • Identify certain external factors that actually measures employee motivation RESEARCH QUESTION: How Do the External Consequences of Organizational Activities Affect Employee Motivation? METHODS: Our thesis involves looking into 3 different but inter-related issues- organizational activities, external consequences and employee motivation. And so, we collated data using the secondary as well as the primary sources of data. Our secondary data includes a review of the literature which is to enlighten us on what has been studied about our topic while the primary data encompasses gathering data by constructing a questionnaire, conducting interviews, and also organising focus groups; all of these to aid giving answer(s) to our research question. FINDINGS: From the research we conducted as well as the analysis we made, we were able to get a proof that there is a strong link between an organization’s activities, the external consequences of such activities as well as how the relationship between these two affects employee motivation. We have been able to establish the fact that employees also look outside their organization for incentives that could enable them to perform their duties properly.

ABSTRACT The sustainability of banks profitability is very important to national economy. This is because banking institution serves as financial intermediary and hence supports the flow of funds from the borrower to the user of fund to grow economic activities. However banks profitability is affected by various variables both internal and internal. Some of these may be control by the banks whiles other may not be controlled internally. To investigate the impact of financial structure and macroeconomic variables on listed banks profitability in Ghana, secondary financial data of all the seven (7) listed banks were collected from the Ghana Stock Exchange. The profitability variables or ratios used are return on equity (ROE), return on asset (ROA) and net profit net interest margin (NIM). The financial structure components considered are the long-term debt to the total capital; short-term debt to total capital. The macroeconomic variables include the GDP, inflationary rate and the Exchange rate (GH¢ per US$). A correlation matrix was run using SPPS regression tool with profitability ratios as the dependent variables whiles the macroeconomic and the financial structure variables are considered as the independent variables. The results were mix: the ROA is negatively related to both total debt and short term debt and the relationship are significant. However, ROA is positively related to long term debt but not statistically significant. ROA is also negatively related to GDP and not statistically significant. ROA is positively related and statistically significant to exchange rate. Again, inflation is positively related to ROA but not significant. ROE on the other hand is statistically significant and positively related to short term debt and total debt. Exchange rate, long term debt is negatively and significantly related to ROE while inflation is positively but insignificantly related to ROE. However, ROE is insignificantly but negatively related to GDP. Net Interest Margin (NIM) is significantly and positively related to short term debt but insignificantly and positively related to inflation. NIM is, however, significantly and negatively related to total debt. This implies that an increase in sales growth, total debt and firm size is likely to result in a fall in NIM. Also, exchange rate, GDP and long term debt are negatively and insignificantly related to NIM. It is important to note that negative relationship between dependent variable and independent variable implies that if the dependent variable increases then the independent variable decreases. Ghanaian banks take advantage of the high inflation regime to increase cost of borrowings to their valued customers to increase their net interest margin and hence increase profitability while strategically using short-term debt in their financial structure to avoid paying long-term high cost of borrowings which will economically destroy shareholders value. Again the banks also increase their assets base as the economy grows (GDP) to improve their profitability in terms of returns on equity through higher banks size to meet all customers and economic activities The study provides an empirical conclusion that listed Ghanaian banks use 80.23% debt and 17.77% equity hence the capital structure of Ghanaian banks is hugely skewed toward debt. However, the debt structure of listed Ghanaian banks indicates more than 70% short term debt and less than 9% long term debt. Thus the impact of capital structure and macro-economic variables on profitability of Ghanaian listed banks is such that short term debt positively influences profitability and long term debt negatively affects profitability.

The transition from engineering roles to management positions is a critical phase in

engineers' career development. However, this transition process often presents

significant challenges and necessitates specific personal characteristics, skills, and

motivators. This study aims to identify the impact of these factors on the transition

from engineering to management roles and investigate their influence on engineers'

career development.

Employing a qualitative approach, this study utilizes thematic analysis to analyze

data derived from in-depth interviews with eight engineers transitioned to

management roles. Transcribed interviews were examined to recognize key themes

related to the research questions.

Thematic analysis uncovered three central themes linked to the transition process:

personal characteristics, skills, and motivators. Personal characteristics

encompassed leadership, communication, and adaptability. Skills comprised

technical and business acumen, project management, and people management.

Motivators encompassed career advancement, financial rewards, and personal

growth. The analysis also revealed prevalent challenges encountered during the

transition process, including adapting to new roles, and managing workload

demands.

This study emphasizes the critical importance of effective career planning and

development to facilitate engineers' successful transition into management roles.

The findings suggest that transitioning from engineering roles to management

positions necessitates a distinct set of personal characteristics, skills, and

appropriate motivators. By actively cultivating these attributes, engineers can

overcome the challenges encountered during the transition process.

Future research is recommended to explore the efficacy of diverse training and

development programs aimed at equipping engineers with the requisite skills and

characteristics essential for a successful transition into management roles.

Internet banking has now become a global phenomenon. It is the fastest growing service that banks can offer in order to gain and retain new customers. However, the issue of adoption behaviour or pattern by final consumers seems to be a pivotal issue in the successful implementation of Internet banking which has benefited people from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and from country to country. In some countries, Internet banking has proven to be very reliable, effective and efficient whilst in some others, they are found to be extremely dormant due to adoption behaviour. This study therefore tried to investigate if there are differences in Internet banking adoption behaviour between Ghana and Sweden. One bank each from Ghana and Sweden was selected for this study. The study employed the theory of the Extended Technology Acceptance Model by Davis and Venkatesh (2000). This model looks at the individual Perceived Usefulness, Perceived Ease of Use and Psychological Attachment of adoption. These three parameters of the theory lead to Behavioural Intention which has a positive correlation with actual usage. The study was based on both qualitative and quantitative approaches and questionnaires were administered to some selected Internet banking customers of the two banks using purposive sampling technique. In the same vein, one banking staff each from the two banks knowledgeable in the Internet banking system of their banks was interviewed. The study concludes that there is only a marginal or subtle difference in the adoption behaviour in Internet banking between Ghana and Sweden and that the low patronage of Internet banking in Ghana as compared to that of Sweden is due to reasons other than customers’ adoption behaviour.

This study, The Challenges faced by Small and Medium Enterprises in Obtaining Credit in Ghana, was undertaken to highlight the issues facing SMEs in Ghana in their quest to accessing bank credit (loans) from financial institutions (banks & non– banks) to undertake various activities; be it general business operations or carrying out expansion project all in the name of fulfilling the objectives as being job creators and helping to reduce poverty. In tackling this topic, the quantitative approach was adopted. Questionnaires were circulated to 80 SMEs in the Accra and Tema metropolis selected through a technique of convenience sampling. Based on the responses received through these questionnaires, the following major findings came to the fore. There are institutions such as bank and non-bank financial institutions that are willing to provide funds to SMEs but Ghanaian SMEs are not able to meet the requirements of these financial institutions. Chief among these requirements is the issue of collateral, which most SMEs cannot provide. Aside this is the other issue of small equity base of these SMEs among others. Secondly, those who are able to access this credit are also faced with high interest rates and short repayment periods making it very difficult to embark on any developmental or expansion projects. Another interesting revelation with regards to the high rate of defaults in repayment of loans contracted, relates to the tight Cash flow situations of these SMEs that is mostly due to difficulties in the management of the account receivables of the respective SMEs surveyed. The study concludes with some recommendations to help free up capital or credit to the SME sector. Among the recommendations are encouraging financial institutions (banks & non-banks) to establish factoring services, enforcement of the credit reporting act and finally provision of tax incentives for banks that lend to SMEs to encourage others to do same.

This case study uses qualitative and quantitative analyses to examine the impact of the annual audits undertaken by the Audit Commission (hereafter the AC) at London Borough of Lambeth (LBL) on its management control system (MCS). The analysis reviews the audits undertaken between the years 2000 and 2010 and analyses the management reaction to these results to identify the impact on MCS. The objective of the research was achieved by developing research questions which served as a research framework. The study focused primarily on three research questions: (1) have the audit scores of the AC influenced MCSs at LBL?; (2) how has the audit scores of the annual audits completed by the AC influenced the MCS of LBL?; and (3) why has the audit scores of the annual audits completed by the AC influenced MCS at LBL?. The theoretical framework used in this study focused on three bodies of literature: the work of the Audit Commission, auditing and audits scores, and MCSs. The thesis used content analysis to analyse LBL’s submissions; audit results and recommendations; and improvement plans. Data for the analysis were collected via documentation, archival records, interviews, and direct and participant observation. As a local government authority, LBL receives most of its annual finance from central government to deliver services to local residents and businesses. As a result the central government, through the AC, audits them every year to ensure that they are effective and efficient with their resources. Between the years 2000 and 2004, LBL audit scores were one star out of possible four stars and this represented considerable risk to its continuous survival. It is worth noting that a council with more than three consecutive score of one star is classified as a failing organisation and that council is taken into ‘special measures’ – a situation where the central government takes administrative control of the council. The trend of audit scores at LBL had indicated the council needed to improve in the areas of: • Financial planning and monitoring; • Service performance improvement in areas such as cultural services; • Performance management processes; and • Use of resources and internal capabilities. After the audit recommendation of 2004, the council developed an improvement plan. This led to the implementation of the new financial control systems, performance management procedure and personnel control system. LBL’s performance measurement imitates the balanced scorecard approach developed by Kaplan and Norton (1992). The reactions at LBL are congruent with the findings of Asel (2009) which demonstrated that organisations with high perceived uncertainty are more likely to change their MCS. The research objectives limited the study scope which has opened opportunities for future research in local authorities such as: MCS as a package; the influence of other stakeholder; trade union contribution to MCS; and organisational leadership at local authorities. It is also worth noting that the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) is in a consultation process with an intention to outsource the work of the AC with effect from 2012/13 audits (www.audit-commission.gov.uk).

Professor Philippe Aghion is the 2016 recipient of the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research, consisting of 100,000 Euros and a statuette designed by the internationally renowned Swedish sculptor Carl Milles. He is one of the most influential researchers worldwide in economics in the last couple of decades. His research has advanced our understanding of the relationship between firm-level innovation, entry and exit on the one hand, and productivity and growth on the other. Aghion has thus accomplished to bridge theoretical macroeconomic growth models with a more complete and consistent microeconomic setting. He is one of the founding fathers of the pioneering and original contribution referred to as Schumpeterian growth theory. Philippe Aghion has not only contributed with more sophisticated theoretical models, but also provided empirical evidence regarding the importance of entrepreneurial endeavours for societal prosperity, thereby initiating a more nuanced policy discussion concerning the interdependencies between entrepreneurship, competition, wealth and growth.

ABSTRACT In today’s world, there is a lot of focus on the importance of leadership behavior and style to the operations of organizations and at the same time, organizations are struggling to attract and retain talented employees. Even though there are many factors that contribute to employee’s decision to either stay in an organization or not, the main aim of this thesis is to investigate the relationship between leadership style and skilled employees’ commitment. This research identified the leadership styles in Ghana Oil Palm Development Company Limited (G. O.P. D. C. Ltd) through ratings using the adapted Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire, which was formulated from Bass and Avolio (1997), the Full Range Leadership Development Theory and rated the employees’ commitment using an adaptation of Meyer and Allen’s (1997) Three-Component Model of employee commitment. This was enhanced by using semi structured interview to explore the problem further. Eight leaders were rated high for transformational leadership behaviors, six transactional and one leader for laissez-faire. Their employee groups were identified with affective, normative and continuance commitments respectively. Other factors identified as contributing to the skilled employee’s decision to leave or remain in the organization included the stages of their working lives, perceived employment options and their sense of devotion to their organization and family commitments. Overall, findings from this study suggest that leadership behaviors do play important roles in determining commitment within an organization. However, the high turnover rate of skilled employees at GOPDC cannot be attributed only to the style of leadership in the organization. In conclusion, it can be said that leadership behaviours result in different levels of commitment among skilled employees. However, other factors also impact on the decision of skilled employees to either remain or leave an organization.

Business Intelligence can bring critical capabilities to an organization, but the implementation of such capabilities is often plagued with problems and issues. Why is it that certain projects fail, while others succeed? The theoretical problem and the aim of this thesis is to identify the factors that are present in successful Business Intelligence projects and organize them into a framework of critical success factors. A survey was conducted during the spring of 2011 to collect primary data on Business Intelligence projects. It was directed to a number of different professionals operating in the Business Intelligence field in large enterprises, primarily located in Poland and primarily vendors, but given the similarity of Business Intelligence initiatives across countries and increasing globalization of large enterprises, the conclusions from this thesis may well have relevance and be applicable for projects conducted in other countries. Findings confirm that Business Intelligence projects are wrestling with both technological and nontechnological problems, but the non-technological problems are found to be harder to solve as well as more time consuming than their technological counterparts. The thesis also shows that critical success factors for Business Intelligence projects are different from success factors for IS projects in general and Business Intelligences projects have critical success factors that are unique to the subject matter. Major differences can be predominately found in the non-technological factors, such as the presence of a specific business need to be addressed by the project and a clear vision to guide the project. Results show that successful projects have specific factors present more frequently than nonsuccessful. Such factors with great differences are the type of project funding, business value provided by each iteration of the project and the alignment of the project to a strategic vision for Business Intelligence. Furthermore, the thesis provides a framework of critical success factors that, according to the results of the study, explains 61% of variability of success of projects. Given these findings, managers responsible for introducing Business Intelligence capabilities should focus on a number of non-technological factors to increase the likelihood of project success. Areas which should be given special attention are: making sure that the Business Intelligence solution is built with end users in mind, that the Business Intelligence solution is closely tied to company‟s strategic vision and that the project is properly scoped and prioritized to concentrate on best opportunities first. Keywords: Critical Success Factors, Business Intelligence, Enterprise Data Warehouse Projects, Success Factors Framework, Risk Management

Title: Total Quality Management: A Test of the Effect of TQM on the Performance and Stakeholder Satisfaction Authors: Adediran Oluwatoyin & Adediran Oluseun Supervisor: Anders Hederstierna Department: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology Course: Master’s thesis in business administration, 15 credits (ECTS). Background and Problem Discussion: The performance of TQM Airlines and Non TQM airlines is measured comparing statistically three major performance indicator Customer satisfaction, Employee satisfaction and Operational effectiveness. To establish a link between TQM and performance and showing the need for the adoption of total quality culture in the local airline sector of the Nigeria aviation industry. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to highlight the benefit of TQM implementation in the Nigerian Airline industry by examining the basic principles of TQM in the airlines. The impact of TQM implementation of the three performance indicator will be assessed. Method: Quantitative and qualitative method. Primary data is collected from the airline companies by questionnaires and interview. Secondary data is gotten from articles, journals and online resources. Theory: The theory section looks at different concepts of quality as defined and viewed by various authors. Also the benefits and hindrances of TQM implementation were reviewed. Analysis: We have used a T-test hypothesis to measure the difference in means of TQM airline and Non-TQM airlines using the three performance indicator. Conclusion: The research findings confirmed the benefits that ensue from the implementation of TQM. It showed that TQM is a strategic tool industry can employ in the quest to remain competitive. It was also discovered that for the TQM to be properly implemented, everybody in the organization must be involved from the management to the employees and even the customers.

Many Automobile companies from the developed countries are moving to Asia as the market potential in these countries is dimishing and cost of production is cheaper. Although there is a larger market potential in Asian countries, each automible company needs to attract potential customers with the ultimate goal of retaining them. A case study based on interviews was carried out at Volvo and Scania subsidiaries in Thailand to investigate the role culture play in business-to-business marketing when companies move to a country with a different culture. As the way of work in Thailand and Sweden is different, culture impact is researched in the area of relational marketing, sales forecast and market survey, market segmentation and business marketing communication with focus on the B2B marketing. Finally we perform analysis to identify what is necessary for the companies to adopt in regards to cultural with the aim of retaining and gaining market share. The analysis is based on empirical data collected during interview with employees of the two companies.

The Internet and e-business has had enormous impact on many companies in Nigeria and there has been much research on how e-business influences the environment, but little can be found on how the environment of a developing country like Nigeria influences e-business. In e-business, technology tells the business what can be done in smarter ways. Technology not only can make business more efficient but also can make business more effective in targeting and reaching markets, however technology cannot enhance business in isolation as there are other vital factors that equally impact business. This thesis presents an adapted version of the PESTEL (Political, Economic, Socio cultural, Technology, Environment, and Legal) framework so called e-business PESTEL framework, as a method for structural analysis of macro environment forces in the future. In addition to this PESTEL framework, the Porter’s five forces model was employed to analyse the industrial forces that also influence MTNN e-business strategy. The main goal of this research is to give an overview of industry and macro-environment forces influencing the e-business strategy MTN-Nigeria and the impact of future developments. The research methodology was explorative and descriptive. A further method for future analysis of the macro-environments influences and a suggestion on how to incorporate it in this research work is given. The e-business strategy of MTNN consists of four areas: E-procurement, E-collaboration (CRM), Supply chain management and E-commerce. The influences found on macro-environments level are political and sociocultural forces and in the industry levels are bargaining power of customers and suppliers of its products and services .The most recommendations are that MTN-Nigeria should add e-business PESTEL framework described in this thesis to its e-business strategy check. Furthermore MTNN should include environment analysis more extensively in their e-business strategy approach as the factors in this research work shape the environment in which it carries out its business.

Green Marketing has become an important strategy in businesses since the international rise of environmental awareness among countries. With greater awareness rising among the public, especially with reference to the global warming and climate change phenomenon, people have become cautious with regards to their purchases, specifically towards the nature of purchased products. As green marketing continues therefore to evolve not only into a strategy but into a platform across the world, Ghana is still at the onset of a green marketing phenomenon. To therefore assess the direction of this phenomenon, the study is aimed at determining the green marketing potential in Ghana as assessed through the perspective of consumers. Environmental Awareness and Consumer Behavior was used in order to assess the presence of a green potential in Ghana. As environmental awareness is able to serve a clear purpose for green consumerism, consumer behavior is able to show the applicative potential of green consumerism. Through online surveys and questionnaires, results of the study were able to reveal a strong green potential existing in Ghana, both with positive indicators within environmental awareness and consumer behavior. Further, results have also noted specific products that have the greatest potential within Ghana‘s green market; green food and body care products showed the highest potential for a prospective green business as reflected in bivariate fit analysis.

An organizational level test strategy needs to incorporate metrics to make the testing activities visible and available to process improvements. The majority of testing measurements that are done are based on faults found in the test execution phase. In contrast, this paper investigates metrics to support software test planning and test design processes. We have assembled metrics in these two process types to support management in carrying out evidence-based test process improvements and to incorporate suitable metrics as part of an organization level test strategy. The study is composed of two steps. The first step creates a relevant context by analyzing key phases in the software testing lifecycle, while the second step identifies the attributes of software test planning and test design processes along with metric(s) support for each of the identified attributes.

Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) tend by their very nature to show a far more volatile pattern of growth and earnings, with greater fluctuations, than larger companies. According to Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) policy brief report on SME development in 2006, Financing is necessary to help Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) set up and expand their operations, develop new products, and invest in new staff or production facilities. The study reveals that the major sources of finance for SMEs in Ghana are trade credit, bank overdraft and bank loans. The internal sources of finance and leasing or hire purchase are the minor source to which only few entrepreneurs resort to. The availability of external financing depends on various factors for instance, general economic outlook, access to public financial support including guarantees, firm-specific outlook with respect to their sales and profitability or business plan, firm’s own capital, firm’s credit history and willingness of commercial banks to provide loan. Many SMEs believe that access to internal funds, for example from retained earnings and sale of assets, bank loans, equity investments in the SMEs, trade credit, and other forms of financing, for example loan from a related company or shareholders, excluding trade credit, loan from family and friends, leasing and factoring are expected to improve the profitability and development of their businesses.

A Customer Rewards Program (CRP) or a loyalty program is characterized by customers being rewarded for repeated purchases. The goal of these programs is to increase sales and profit through offering purchase incentives in the form of delayed rewards, as a result influencing customer behavior and in the end increasing company profit. It is an open debate in the literature if such reward programs are truly profitable for the company running it. This thesis therefore proposes a new approach to designing a CRP based on optimization methods with a focus on maximizing the expected profitability of the program. The key finding of the thesis is that such an approach can be applied to CRPs in order to increase the profitability of the companies running such programs. The approach offers promising results towards applicability to specific business segments and as a result towards maximizing the expected profits resulting from customer rewards programs. Since a largescale CRP may require significant developments on existing infrastructure and can pose high costs through the rewards redeemed during the program, the perspective of being able to maximize profits through fine-tuning the program parameters could be of great help. It can even be crucial to a company considering large investments on necessary developments or aiming to increase the returns on an existing CRP infrastructure. As part of the thesis we have analyzed the – at the time of writing – running CRP programs of several major companies present on the Hungarian market based on publicly available data in order to evaluate the applicability of the proposed optimization approach to real-world CRP designs. The analysis done on these real-world CRP designs indicates that the proposed optimization approach is applicable to a class of CRP designs witnessed to be popular among companies operating in various business segments. We have also investigated Hungary’s largest pharmacy-chain to gain insight into real-world CRP design considerations. Based on guided interviews conducted with the head of marketing at the aforementioned pharmacy-chain we conclude that the relevant information needed for our proposed optimization approach can be available to a company from business data (e.g. through billing and accounting information) readily available in an integrated IT infrastructure. We also conclude that the proposed theoretical results on CRP design are based on valid mathematical assumptions and correlate to accounting considerations related to the introduction of a CRP program.

The main objective for this thesis is to identify a set of challenges imposed on an organization undergoing strategic change impacting their IT Landscape. Organizations most embark on strategic change initiatives in order to remain competitive and create business value. It is important to understand these challenges imposed during the change process in order to be prepared and able to minimize the negative impact they may have if not handle properly. For this purpose within the scope of this thesis the aim is to identify challenge areas and the specific challenges they may impose. These identified challenges can be used as a baseline for organizations in order to understand which areas to address in order to minimize negative impact during a strategic change related to their IT Landscape. A case study methodology was used in this thesis and relevant research through literature review in identified topics was conducted. Communication, leadership, business value and strategy realization, knowledge management and change management are examined through the theoretical framework and identified as areas in need of attention during a strategic change initiative. Also within the theoretical framework this thesis identifies Enterprise Architecture as an enabler for succeeding with the change initiative related to the IT Landscape. The qualitative empirical data for this thesis was collected through the interview of ten professionals within four different organizations. Based on the above approach, within the scope for this thesis, a set of challenge areas and specific challenges were identified and the conclusion was that these areas are important to address during a strategic change initiative impacting IT Landscape within an organization in order to ensure a successful outcome.

The sorting of high-ability workers is often advanced as one source of spatial disparities in economic outcomes. There are still few papers that analyze when human capital sorting occurs and whom it involves. Using data on 16 cohorts of university graduates in Sweden, we demonstrate significant sorting to urban regions on high school grades and education levels of parents, i.e., two attributes typically associated with latent abilities that are valued in the labor market. A large part of this sorting has already occurred in deciding where to study, because the top universities in Sweden are predominantly located in urban regions. The largest part of directed sorting on ability indicators occurs in the decision of where to study. Even after controlling for sorting prior to labor market entry, the best and brightest are still more likely to start working in urban regions. However, this effect appears to be driven by Sweden's main metropolitan region, Stockholm. We find no influence of our ability indicators on the probability of starting to work in urban regions after graduation when Stockholm is excluded. Studies of human capital sorting need to account for selection processes to and from universities, because neglecting mobility prior to labor market entry is likely to lead to an underestimation of the extent of the sorting to urban regions.

Little academic research has been conducted in the area of open innovation as a strategy used by SMEs in their innovation process. In addition, small companies are subjected to liabilities to smallness and newness, for which open innovation could be the solution. This thesis focuses on two small Swedish high– tech companies. On the one hand we concentrate our studies on a software consultancy company providing programming services, on the other hand, the thesis also look on a small nano–technology company creating their product around material science innovation. The purpose of this study is to investigate what strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats these specific high-tech companies perceive in using open innovation in their business model. For accomplishing the investigations we have conducted two case studies. Through a review of relevant literature, a theoretical framework was first constructed, up on which we based the formulation of open-ended questions, to serve as a foundation for further data gathering. For the first case study, data was collected by interviewing the case firm’s CEO and for the second case study we used the participant observation method. The collected data was analysed and discussed in comparison to the literature. Additionally, the findings of each case were schematically evaluated by performing a SWOT analysis on open innovation, as observed by each of our two case firms and related to literature findings. Conclusions. We conclude that small firms are hampered in their innovation and commercialisation process is limitations related to smallness and newness. It was identified that, although limited by financial and structural constrains, small companies are able to use a considerable amount of open innovation aspects in their business model. These being especially those that are less resource demanding, such as employee involvement and co-creation with the customer or with other sources to innovation, like universities. It was also recognized that, while being open when capitalizing on certain aspects of open innovation to boost their innovation and commercialization process, the case firms also recognize the importance for especially small firms to protect the core technology knowledge from being leaked externally, as this is the vital component of their existence.

There has been significant growth in Islamic banking sector over the last two decades and this market has become very competitive in many Islamic countries. Islamic banking products are regulated by law of Islam and regulatory authority in that particular country. Our main objective is that given the standards of Islamic financial systems, are the Islamic banks compliance with those principles. Some specific banks will be selected and so shall be the scope of standards. The solutions implemented by Islamic banks will be analyzed critically against these standards and suggestions for improvement will be presented. The secondary objective is to compare specific products offered by Islamic banks with corresponding products of conventional banks (competitors working in same country and thus regulated by same government body). Then we will present critical analysis of both products in terms of monetary value and conditions imposed by each bank.

Retaining employees is an important goal of every organization. This thesis explores the factors that can significantly impact employee retention in an organisation. It attempts to relate some of the factors discovered to major theories such as the Employee Equity Model, Herzberg’s (Two-Factor) Theory and the Job Embeddedness Theory. The literature surveyed by this study mention employee motivation, job satisfaction and job embeddedness as the main factors that influence employee retention rates. The study proposes that job embeddedness is a superior model that significantly explains employee retention. The population for the study were 53 respondents out of 75 taken from a patent firm in Australia, a representation of the rapidly growing knowledge industry. The participants of the survey were contacted through private email and selected for the study by simple random sampling done via the listing of the employee names in a spreadsheet program. The survey questions were categorized under six major theories of employee retention with each category having an average of five questions. Four most significant theories emerging were compared and the theory best explaining employee retention was chosen. The four most significant theories were Employee Equity Model, Herzberg’s (Two-Factor) Theory and the Job Embeddedness Theory, and the one that most explains employee retention was Herzberg’s (Two-Factor) Theory. This implies that notwithstanding the age of the Two-Factor theory, it is still significant for managing employee retention in today’s rapidly expanding service- and knowledge-based organizations.

Abstract Title: Client Information Needs of MFIs: A Case Study of ASA Bangladesh Author: Juber Ahmed Academic Advisor: Dr. Klaus Solberg Søilen Department: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology Course: Master Thesis in Business Administration Purpose: To enrich the knowledge base of client’s needs of financial services and assessing the tools MFIs used to collect clients’ information and how they utilized the information for developing new products and services or modifying existing products and services or their terms and conditions to meet the needs of financial services of their clientele. Also how MFIs organized and managed the information and how they categorized their clients using that information. Method: The investigation conducted from both a theoretical and an empirical point of view. The deductive approach used for the study and the case study method deployed. I studied ASA which is an MFI renowned in Bangladesh and beyond. At first, I had gone through a secondary research for collecting a number of successful methods and standard types of information used by successful MFIs from existing literature. In primary research, I interviewed 10 Managers (Assistant Directors) for ASA to determine which of the methods found in the literature were more effective for collecting clients’ information for them and also asked them to add their ideas to the list. At last I asked interviewees to rate the methods and results presented in this paper. Theory: This study was an exploratory one where I discussed the related aspects for the study - Microfinance, Client Assessment, Clients of Microfinance, Information needs and Management Information System. Findings: The study showed that ASA utilized client information for developing their credit products and services and based on number of loans taken by the clients they categorized their clients and modified or developed new products and services for each category of clients. Although ASA executed several tools for collecting client information but the managers think that their staffs’ collection of information from regular meeting with clients was more effective than others for modifying products’ terms and conditions and modifying or developing new products and services to their women and small enterprise clients. The conducted study also revealed that in ASA impact study was necessary to know clients’ overall level of satisfaction but management needed specific information on what aspects of ASA and its credit products and services clients preferred and did not prefer and the reasons of the preferences. Also they needed action plan to address clients’ specific concerns, so they needed the information on a continual basis and they were successful to achieve this continuous flow of information. For ASA, the best way to get this type of information would be through client satisfaction Focus Group Discussions (FGDs), although they utilized several tools but not often as discussed in part 3 in chapter 5. ASA owned an MIS (AMMS) for monitoring and managing clients’ information and they utilized this to categorize their clients based on the collected information about their number of loans. Conclusion: This study revealed that ASA served only women and small enterprise clientele that included the vulnerable non-poor and could contribute to the profitability of ASA. There was no attempt to diversify the products to include all poor that should be the goal of microfinance to alleviate poverty. Moreover client treated as individual client but the loans used to fulfill household or family needs of the clients. There were tools for collecting information on household about impact of credit programs participation but they took seldom effort for collecting information of the household money management or in other words how they utilized the loans for variety of household needs. There is lack of access to a variety of financial services for poor clients, even though MFIs are mostly serving vulnerable non-poor instead of taking consideration of all categories of poor. It revealed from the study that MFIs could gain long term success by serving specific market segment but it should not be only focus of MFIs, their initiative should be to include all poor in their clients profile with a priority to a specific market segment. This could help them to become sustainable and to minimize risks by spreading it in different market segments. The study found that ASA considered FGDs as an effective tool for collecting clients’ information as their staffs and managers were familiar with this tool, moreover it was cost effective for them. It observed that they seldom followed Tool Selection Process and it was the top management that decided over the tools, the decision might influence by internal and external interest groups and the competition. MFIs should organize client information in a way so that they could be able to manipulate the specific client information to serve client better and to take effective decision, although it is imperative to argue that they may like to serve the wealthier clients. This research paper is also presenting some important findings from existing literature of microfinance and a number of recommendations based on the study experience and scholars opinions from existing microfinance study that may help MFIs to prepare themselves to adopt client-oriented approach by utilizing client assessment tools to fulfill the needs of financial services of their clients that may hopefully include all poor irrespective of their categories.

Governments in both developing and developed countries provide services to its citizen however some provide better services than the others. Public services generally include facilities of health, education, electricity and water supply, social welfare, transportation, communication and other services. Countries face many challenges while providing these services to citizens and many developing countries have failed to provide the public services efficiently and are facing issues while providing service delivery to its citizens. One of the issues is corruption. The developing countries need to adopt e-governance and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to overcome these issues. E-governance is a process of improving through Information Technology (IT), the way government works, shares information, interacts with clients (citizen, Business, Government) and provides services to clients. Our thesis will investigate whether ICT can combat corruption and improve Public Service Delivery (PSD) in developing countries. Findings of our study will help developing countries in combating corruption and improving public services. We have reviewed the literature related to public service delivery, corruption and its adverse effects, use of ICT and e-governance to combat corruption. We have adopted a case study approach to see what sorts of ICT initiatives are being taken by the government of Punjab to reduce corruption and improve the public services. In this regard we have explored the e-governance projects of PITB (Information Technology department of the Government of Punjab) including one of a recent project of PITB namely Citizen Feedback Model (CFM) which has got international attention worldwide for combating corruption and improving public services delivery. We have performed quantitative analysis on six months data set of CFM which was comprised of over one hundred and seventy thousand responses categorized in predefined categories of feedback. By doing the quantitative analysis of CFM data we have found that this particular e-governance project is reducing corruption of public officials and improving public service delivery. Further explanations are provided through information gathered by interviews. Finally we have tied our results to findings in the literature and suggested implications.

This investigate an important options of cost reductions, offshore outsourcing is found interesting, these days phenomenon of economic downturn, decreasing oil prices and credit crunch cause intense competition so this study is an attempt to understand factors that what are the driving forces for offshore outsourcing in engineering services industry. This project studies the factors of offshore outsourcing practices of engineering services companies in the UK. The scope of study limited to industrial engineering services primarily in oil and gas industry, so this project is also aimed to understand offshore outsourcing practices of UK engineering services sector. The purpose of research is to review the available literature on offshore outsourcing and understand offshore outsourcing situations. This research will focus on knowledge in these fields. The discussions on finding would be focus on why “company” needs offshore outsourcing and “how” different factors help engineering services companies to take offshore outsourcing decisions

Corporate Social Responsibility has been a very topical issue in contemporary times, but an in-depth understanding of this salient concept is quite questionable to many including actors in corporate spheres. This we could attribute to ignorance or limited research work to propagate what corporate social responsibility means and the benefits it may bring forth if properly adhered to by corporations. This paper thus has as fundamental focus to clarify and enhance the understanding of corporate social responsibility as well as the extent to which corporations adhere to the ever increasing demands emanating from stakeholders (consumers, governments, employees, environmental activists etc) for socially responsibility. The extent to which corporate social responsibility is a valid criterion to judge the actions of corporations is also of special interest in this research work. This paper adopts a theoretical and an empirical approach to provide a better understanding of corporate social responsibility, while a broad based exploratory case study approach is used to investigate the activities of some selected multinationals across the globe .We used three management responsibility categories technique to bridge our findings to our conclusions that the management style of multinationals examined fall under the immoral category associated highly with socially irresponsible companies which typically do not consider stakeholder interests. The paper unravels the devastative effects of their activities on consumers, the environment, employees, and local communities whose interest and well being they should enhance from the corporate social responsibility perspective. The paper concludes with some limitations encountered in this study and suggestions for further research.

Leaders of today have the challenge to lead in a complex, rapidly changing, multicultural context. In most industries, leaders perform tasks on a global level and they are required to have the necessary competencies to be more effective. It is a well-known fact that organizations are still negatively affected in terms of competitiveness and growth, due to leaders` lack of capabilities to lead effectively. Furthermore, despite the previous academic contributions, global leadership still remains a developing field to be explored. Previous studies on the global leadership listed various competencies to lead to effectively in a global environment. However, a limited evidence was provided to support direct relationship between those competencies and the global leadership effectiveness. Moreover, previous studies have concentrated mainly on defining global leadership competencies, but there is still a gap to understand which of those competencies makes global leaders effective. There is also a strong need for conducting more empirical studies in the field. In response to this gap, the purpose of this research is to identify necessary competencies for global leadership effectiveness and test them empirically. Structural Equation Modelling was used as a research method with the data collected from a questionnaire of 175 respondents worldwide, mainly located in Europe. The results of the research showed that Cross-Cultural Experience, Cultural Flexibility and Stress Tolerance predict global leadership effectiveness. Furthermore, detailed explanation of each competency that predict global leadership effectiveness were provided. The results of this research have both theoretical and managerial implications. Firstly, it proves empirically and quantitatively the relationship between identified competencies and global leadership effectiveness. Secondly, the results of the research contribute to the existing literature where there is a limited amount of research that focus on understanding global leadership competencies and global leadership effectiveness. 

The study aimed to investigate and critically analyze claims management, an ethical issue in insurance companies in Nigeria, to find out if these insurance companies recognize it to be an ethical issue and also to find out how they handle insured’s claims. A qualitative research method was used in carrying out this study; data was sourced through interviews and by secondary data using literatures from books, journals, articles, and electronic websites. The researchers used purposive sampling to select some top insurance companies in Nigeria; in these insurance companies basically personnel working in the claims department were interviewed, also sales agents from two of these insurance companies were interviewed. Data was sourced from two insurance broking firms in Nigeria by interviewing their top personnel, and also some of the insuring public with and without insurance policies was interviewed. The analytical strategy adopted in this research work was to rely on theoretical propositions. This study made use of Jones (1991) moral intensity model. Based on the analysis of data collected during the interview, the study revealed that insurance personnel in claims administration who take decision on insured’ claims in Nigeria recognize that there is a moral dilemma in their act and they discharge this responsibility professionally and ethically sticking to the rules of the business. Also the characteristics that constitute moral intensity model; proximity, social context, probability of effect, concentration of effect and magnitude of consequence offered by Jones (1991) influence the moral decision making process and moral behavior of claims personnel in Nigeria insurance companies. But due to some challenges faced by these personnel in discharging their duty and some lapses from their side and the insured’s there have always been complaint on claims. However they acknowledge that no one is perfect therefore they are open to getting feedbacks from their clients on the way they feel about their claims which they look into and make necessary amendments where needed. This study concluded with proposition for future researchers to look into how the challenges encountered by personnel managing insured’s’ claims in insurance companies in Nigeria can be dealt with and to find out how insurance companies in Nigeria can gain the awareness of the insuring public and make them understand the terms and conditions of insurance service.

The study aimed to investigate and critically analyze claims management, an ethical issue in insurance companies in Nigeria, to find out if these insurance companies recognize it to be an ethical issue and also to find out how they handle insured’s claims. A qualitative research method was used in carrying out this study; data was sourced through interviews and by secondary data using literatures from books, journals, articles, and electronic websites. The researchers used purposive sampling to select some top insurance companies in Nigeria; in these insurance companies basically personnel working in the claims department were interviewed, also sales agents from two of these insurance companies were interviewed. Data was sourced from two insurance broking firms in Nigeria by interviewing their top personnel, and also some of the insuring public with and without insurance policies was interviewed. The analytical strategy adopted in this research work was to rely on theoretical propositions. This study made use of Jones (1991) moral intensity model. Based on the analysis of data collected during the interview, the study revealed that insurance personnel in claims administration who take decision on insured’ claims in Nigeria recognize that there is a moral dilemma in their act and they discharge this responsibility professionally and ethically sticking to the rules of the business. Also the characteristics that constitute moral intensity model; proximity, social context, probability of effect, concentration of effect and magnitude of consequence offered by Jones (1991) influence the moral decision making process and moral behavior of claims personnel in Nigeria insurance companies. But due to some challenges faced by these personnel in discharging their duty and some lapses from their side and the insured’s there have always been complaint on claims. However they acknowledge that no one is perfect therefore they are open to getting feedbacks from their clients on the way they feel about their claims which they look into and make necessary amendments where needed. This study concluded with proposition for future researchers to look into how the challenges encountered by personnel managing insured’s’ claims in insurance companies in Nigeria can be dealt with and to find out how insurance companies in Nigeria can gain the awareness of the insuring public and make them understand the terms and conditions of insurance service.

Studies have shown that application of innovation in products and marketing as strategy is important to the survival of a firm. However, only few companies are adopting this concept as a major strategy due to their obliviousness to its imminent contribution to the corporate goal. Many of the early adopters of this concept are also failing to achieve the most from it due to their lack of proper understanding of its fundamental and benefits. This study analysed empirically the impact of product innovation on sales volume of consumer goods using Philips consumer electronics, a division of Philips B.V as a case study. Identified hypothesis concerning the relationship between product innovation and the company corporate goal were tested with the use of telephone interviews and questionnaire to stimulate responses from staff of the firm and the consumer of its products. Analysing of the responses obtained from the field study showed that lack of product innovation could affect the organisation’s profit and consumer satisfaction because of its great impact on consumers' buying decision. Monitoring and responding accordingly to changes in consumers’ taste will ensure success in product innovation. Evidently, adoption of product innovation can lead to increase in sales volume of a firm’s product. The finding of this research work will be useful to the firm used as a case study in regards to better development of its innovation funnel with feedback from market trends and consumer dynamic needs. Although, this research work used a single company for analysis, however the result of the findings can be adequately applied to other firms especially firms within the same industry.

ABSTRACT Title: Working Capital Management in Telecommunication sector: A case study of VGC telecoms Author: Gbenga Segun Akinwande Supervisor: Anders Hederstierna Department: School of Management, Blekinge Institute of Technology Course: Master’s thesis in business administration, 15 credits (ECTS). Background and Problem Discussion: The efficient management of working capital is very vital for a business survival. This is premised on the fact having too much working capital signifies inefficiency, whereas too little cash at hand signifies that the survival of business is shaky. Purpose: The purpose of this research is to study the working capital management in the small and medium scale businesses, using VGC Telecoms Company as a case study, so as to establish factors influencing working capital performance; examine how cash management, inventory management and trade credit management affects working capital management; company effectiveness in converting working capital to ready money; how working capital management impacts on the problem of slow development and to offer recommendations on possible ways of improving working capital management Method: Literatures bordering on different areas of working capital management were reviewed. Thus, this research employed qualitative and quantitative analysis; and semi- structured questions were drafted based on the issues raised from the review of various literatures. In addition, materials from journal articles, textbooks, working papers and industry practitioners are put into consideration. The use of internet and e-mails to send out questions were explored where appropriate. Analysis on the company’s financial statement was carried out in order to verify my findings. Theory: In this research, the theory section looks at various concepts that come up when analyzing the consequences of working capital management for company value and the factors that influence a company’s working capital management performance. I have therefore chosen the most common concept for the theory section. I have also tried to create a theoretical understanding for the company’s sensitivity to a workable WCM policy Analysis: In the analysis of the research findings, I employed qualitative approach to the data analysis whereby the impacts of the poor WCM on the company were discussed in depth. Conclusion: The findings corroborate the postulation of Weston et al that a company’s investment in working capital is a substantial percentage of its total investment. In case of VGC Telecoms, it is as high as 65 percent. An inefficient and ineffective management of this investment will result in slow pace of development and ultimately to the business failure. The performances of the company in the different spheres of working capital management were scored as follows:- • Cash management – 65.4 percent • Inventory management - 78.6 percent • Trade credit management and financing decisions - 60.0 percent This is an average performance of 68 percent. That is, the company’s performance is above average. This is a good performance. The financial statements as interpreted reinforce the validity of this result. The liquidity ratios are high; the collection period is short; and the cash cycle is not quite expansive. This makes it possible to sustain sufficient cash flow for the smooth running of the business. The management of working capital impacts on liquidity, investment portfolio and profitability. All these three factors are decisive in the growth or failure of a business. Hence, good performances in working capital management affects these decisive factors favourably and thus, contribute to growth and success of the business.

The Governments and workers have put in a great effort in regularizing the working hours and working week over the course of last one and a half century. The average work week in the world stands at 40 hours. With unemployment among all the work force in Sweden almost hitting 11 percent and in youth aged 15-24 hitting almost 27 percent. It’s definitely alarming and requires measures to reduce. Different political forces in Sweden including Green Party and left party have joined forces in reducing the working week to 30 hours. The reduction in the working hours certainly presents a solution to different issues like work life balance, quality of life and work satisfaction but is it a solution to reduce unemployment at the same time source of motivation? That is the fundamental question we have tried to answer in the pages to follow. The reduction in working hours, during the economic downturn of 2008, supported financially by Government of Germany actually helped save at least half a million jobs. Volvo Power Train saved a number of jobs in Sweden by reducing the working hours of all the employees, so did Scania, and Saab in Sweden. Toyota reduced the working hours of its employees in 1990s to increase motivation, job satisfaction and quality of life. Our research has shown that if working hours are reduced then jobs can not only be saved, but can be created as well. In the following pages you will come across information obtained through number of information sources and printed material which directly aims at looking into how reduction in working hours can reduce unemployment. Our research presents different scenarios where reduction in the hours can generate employments. The debate however is open for future researchers to test these scenarios and see if they are viable proposals and can help reduce the employment.

Background: This study examines online shopping in different cultures and technologies in relation to customer satisfaction in Stockholm and Accra; a developed city with a developing city respectively. In recent times, the use of the internet has rapidly increased around the globe and with it emerged online shopping as a means employed by which business organizations and individual sellers and service providers to maximize growth. Customer satisfaction is an essential element for attaining stability and growth in the business world and online shopping is no exception. Even though customer satisfaction is a universal phenomenon, it can be controlled by culture and technology. 

Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to compare a developed city with a developing one and the interplay of culture and technology in achieving customer satisfaction in online shopping. This thesis therefore seeks to investigate the different cultures and technologies on satisfaction by ascertaining the degree to which factors relating to culture and technology affect customer satisfaction in online shopping.

Methodology: Quantitative research method is employed to conduct this thesis. By the use of the snowball sampling method, residents of both Stockholm and Accra were sampled and data collection was done by administering survey questionnaire. SPSS software package was used to analyse research data. The Spearman rank correlation and Mann-Whitney U test were performed using the SPSS software package to arrive at the research results and draw conclusions.

Results & Conclusions: This research demonstrates the existence of differences in the culture and technology of Stockholm and Accra. It also demonstrates the impact of selected factors for independent variables (culture and technology) on customer satisfaction in online by showing their inter-relationship. It also reveals the factors which most affected customer satisfaction in online shopping in this thesis. In general, the correlations demonstrated that culture had more impacts on customer satisfaction in online shopping as compared to technology. A good relationship was found between customer satisfaction and culture, and technology provided by the participants from Accra. For Stockholm participants, customer satisfaction in online shopping had a relationship with cultural factors. It was shown in the findings that all four factors measuring culture such as trust, moral, law, and knowledge, and only two factors measuring technology such as internet speed and tools affected customer satisfaction in online shopping in Accra with the most affected factors being trust and moral. In the case of Stockholm, only two factors measuring culture, such as moral and trust affected customer satisfaction in online shopping and moral most affected customer satisfaction. None of the four factors measuring technology affected customer satisfaction. All in all, considering both independent variables, we argued that culture (factors) affected most customer satisfaction in online shopping.

Recommendations for future research: Further research can be done by employing both qualitative and quantitative analysis techniques to know how these factors affect customer satisfaction in online shopping. In addition, to better generalize the results, further research could be done with the same concepts but with more factors used to measure the independent and dependent variables. Moreover, similar research could also be done by considering only one group of products or items bought online. Furthermore, the same or similar research can be done using more than one question to describe the factors or sub-variables. Last but not least, further research can deploy a larger sample size to facilitate generalization.

Purpose. A small number of management theories have had as much influence in the business world as Clayton M. Christensen’s theory of disruptive innovation. Its key presupposition – that entrant companies with products or services that customers initially couldn’t use as it appears to have lower performance can supersede established companies – continues to create a significant impact on management practices and stimulate rich debate within academics. The goal of this thesis is to validate a specific framework available on the literature that assess the potential market entry of new companies as sources of disruptive innovations, named “disruptive susceptibility”, and gain new insights based on the findings of a qualitative study related to the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) industry. Trending topics on this fast paced evolving industry, such as “Connected Cars” or “Autonomous Vehicles” are creating a high source of inspiration and new technologies are emerging to address new ITS industry’s needs.

Methodology. Mixed methods research approach was applied utilizing convergent parallel mixed design. The research design process enabled an accurate confrontation of the disruptive susceptibility framework’s propositions against the target industry’s evidences collected from multiple relevant sources of evidences. Content validity and triangulation were applied to bring validity to the study.

Theory. Disruptive innovation, Disruptive Susceptibility, Industry life-cycle.

Conclusions. The disruptive susceptibility framework was validated for the ITS industry concluding that is a relevant instrument to identify and qualify the disruptive potential of new technologies. The results showed a high level of disruptive susceptibility in the ITS industry and the evidence gathered showed that conditional and accelerating propositions, when present, are most likely connected to an industry in a mature life-cycle stage. The study of the framework in further industries could provide more insights about this latter aspect. Furthermore, an additional proposition related to product life-cycles was proposed for the framework.

Integration of generative artificial intelligence (GAI) is an emerging technology that promises to enhance the pre-acquisition mergers and acquisitions (M&A) process through data analytics, due diligence and decision-making support. This study aims to explore the potential benefits and strategic advantages of incorporating GAI in the M&A process, focusing particularly on the pre-acquisition stage to understand how GAI can contribute to critical factors for M&A transactions.

The study used qualitative methods, specifically semi-structured interviews with M&A professionals. Thematic analysis was used to interpret the empirical data, identifying key themes regarding the integration and impact of GAI in M&A. The Resource Based View theory was selected as the theoretical lens when assessing the potential integration of GAI in the M&A process.

Findings suggest that GAI may enhance efficiency and accuracy in due diligence, valuation, and strategic decision-making. However, the integration of GAI may also present challenges, including the need for substantial adaptation of existing workflows and addressing potential security risks.

GAI holds considerable promise for improving the M&A process by providing strategic advantages such as enhanced decision-making, efficiency, and consistency. However, the successful implementation of GAI in M&A requires careful consideration of organizational readiness and potential ethical implications. Recommendations for Future Research: Further research is needed to explore the long-term impacts of GAI on the competitive dynamics of M&A, the scalability of AI tools, and the broader implications of AI integration across different industries and regulatory environments.

Background: In today’s markets almost all products we buy come packaged. We use packaging to protect, contain and identify products. Furthermore if this is executed in a skillful way consumers often choose products based on packaging. The work of a designer and marketer is therefore extremely valuable when it comes to the design of a package. Problem: How are packages used to communicate marketing information? Purpose: The focus of this thesis is to identify differences and similarities of a packaging's visual elements from the perspectives of designers and marketers. Method: Interviews with designers and marketers. The theoretical knowledge has served as the basis for our empirical work and lead to a research model from which an interview guide was formed. Conclusion: According to our respondents and theory, packaging is a big component in a brand's marketing strategy that communicates the brand’s message and values. Marketing information can be designed into visual elements that are used on the package to communicate a message that speaks to consumers' emotions. Our results showed that 'color' is the visual element the professionals use to catch the attention of consumers and most effectively influence their emotions. Designers and marketers can together achieve successful packaging as the designer combines design elements that tell the brand's story and the marketer knows how the package sells and maximizes profit today.

In the current economic climate the circumstances and the environment for companies constantly change and organizations which in the future want to be competitive have to adapt to these new conditions and market requirement else they are forced to be out of business. Seeing the rapid change in telecom sector with flat sales in many countries during 2008, 2009 and 2010 Ericsson decided to do a major re organization in 2010. Ericsson management set out to restructure the company to trim off fat and to help the company function as a leaner and more productive entity by assigning transformational leaders that can help company cope with the changing market conditions with focus on business performance, growth, new market segments and getting more close to customer. As a result of that change Ericsson Saudi Arabia that was known as Market Unit Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (MU KSA) part of 23 Market Units across the globe transformed to Customer Unit Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (CU KSA) part of Region Middle East (RMEA) with new Head and management team. By 2009-2010 Ericsson CU KSA was facing issues like flat sales, operators were cautious to spend more money since revenues were declining, emergence of Chinese players in the marker resulted in dramatic culture shift in industry where business models and ways of working changed and Ericsson in Saudi Arabia was having direct impact on revenue and market share. During 2008, 2009 and 2010 Ericsson in Saudi Arabia lost local market share from 60% to 50% and a complete overhaul was inevitable. One of the primary objectives of this study will be to determine the relationship of transformational leadership to organizational performance by analyzing data collected from Ericsson Saudi Arabia. It will be analyzed if new management in Ericsson Saudi Arabia has the capabilities of transformational leadership. Later I’ll try to establish correlation of transformational leadership towards strategic management, Organizational culture and Employee Motivation & Commitment to see if there is any significant impact of these that will help overcome existing market challenges explore new opportunities and redefine strategies while resulting in positive business growth and performance. For the purpose of research a study a mix of qualitative and quantitative approach was chosen. Questionnaire surveys were used as part of quantitative research. Interview surveys together with Sales reports and balanced score cards were used as part of qualitative research. A total of 48 questionnaire surveys along with 8 interviews form different members of management in CU KSA were conducted. Data analysis tool function in Excel was used to figure out mean, median and standard deviation for Transformational leadership attributes. Data analysis tool was also used to calculate correlation coefficient factor between transformational leadership with strategic management, organizational culture and business performance. It was discovered after analysis conducted using interview and survey results that Ericsson CU KSA Head and Management fulfill the criterion of transformational leadership having strong presence of transformational leadership attributes namely vision, Inspirational, role model, support for personal growth, trust and consideration for followers needs. It was also discovered that transformational leadership has a strong correlation towards strategic management, organizational culture, employee Motivation and business performance. Data collected from Interviews, Sales reports and Balanced Score Card supported the data analysis of questionnaire. This means that if companies want to experience growth in their business especially in these days of tough competition, there should be focus on making sure the leadership is transformational with strong emphasis on process of Strategic Management, fostering organization culture and boosting employee motivation & commitment that will lead towards positive Business Performance.

This thesis study explores the existing knowledge management and sharing practices in donor organizations, particularly working in the developing countries. The potentional of knowledge management and sharing to facilitate development organizations in carrying out development work has been recognised in the literature. Literature presented mix of critique and appreciation to the existing efforts of donor agencies. Knowledge sharing platforms revolves around the country initiatives and donor agencies like UNDP and World Bank which are proactive in establishing these platforms for partner organizations. This research contributes practical insight to the question of delivery of these platforms, through an empirical investigation based on the development professionals' experiences. As earlier research shows enormous amount of literature on individual, team and organizational level knowledge sharing, this study sets prime focus on community level or external knowledge sharing, an area where there exist a dearth of emperical research or contributing literature on examing the role of sharing initiatives and possible contribution in improving risk management in development projects. Literature shows the potential of knowledge management and sharing practices, as their possible contribution in the global development practices and in bridging gap between North-South stakeholders. However, cultural, technological, organizational and individual level issues escalate with external level of knowledge sharing and thesis rightly, identifies success factors from the literature alongwith their viability from the professionals. It is even more inadequate when it comes to projects of donor organizations in under developed and developing countries. With 80% of documented failure rates of knowledge sharing systems, external knowledge sharing with partner organizations or network organizations is really not adequate and do not have supporting culture. As this whole process of sharing knowledge, heavily relies on the perceived motivation and willingness to share, study has tried to identify the challenges facing wider use of these sharing systems. Study also contributes with suggestions for knowledge management and sharing system developers, policy and decision makers and system users, to improve the overall contribution of knowledge sharing in better risk management. Apart from the cultural barriers, there are technical and policy level issues which need more concerted efforts to improve the use of these sharing systems by various organizations and individuals.

Background: Services are without doubt the driving force in today’s economies in many countries. The increased importance of the service sector in industrialized economies and its productivity rates are testified by the fact that the current list of Fortune 500 companies contains more service companies and fewer manufacturing companies than in previous decades. Many products today are being transformed into services or have a higher service component than previously. In the development of this increasingly important bundling of services with products, outsourcing and offshoring play a key role. Companies have been outsourcing work for many years now appointing the latter a well-established phenomenon. Outsourcing to foreign countries, referred to as offshoring, has also been fuelled by ICT and globalization, where firms can capitalize on price and cost differentials between countries. Constant improvements in technology and global communications virtually guarantee that the future will bring much more outsourcing of services, and more specifically, outsourcing of IT services. While outsourcing and offshoring strategies play an important role in IT services, we would like to investigate the drivers that affect the successful outcome of an offshore outsourcing engagement. Purpose: The principle aim of the present study is therefore twofold: a) to identify key drivers for the successful outsourcing of IT services seen from the outsourcing partner’s perspective and b) to investigate how the outsourcing partner prioritizes these drivers.

Social media, especially the social networking sites (SNS) like Facebook.com, has experienced exponential growth all across the globe in the last decade. It is rapidly attracting the consumers and replacing the traditional media. Electronic word of mouth (eWOM) through social media has acquired substantial position in the marketing mix as well as integrated marketing communication of the business organizations. This research aimed at analyzing different social relationship factors or determinants of engagement of the UK consumers in the process of viral marketing from the perspective of the university students in the UK. The process of viral marketing on SNSs is initiated by the manufacturers, marketers or distributors but the process is controlled by the consumers. To meet the main objectives of the research, quantitative research methods were followed through deductive approach. Convenience and purposive sampling were utilized in order to select a sample of 130 students from the population of the UK university students. Only 105 students responded and took part in the survey. All the ethical issues involved in the survey were catered and participants were informed about the purpose of investigation through consent letters prior to email the questionnaire. The questionnaire was emailed to the students to collect primary data that was statistically analyzed by using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences). The data for each variable was subjected to univariate analysis in order to evaluate the significance of each social factor under study. The results obtained from univariate analysis were graphically presented and interpreted. Correlation (Bivariate) analysis of different factors including trust, homophily, interpersonal influence, love for exchanging information etc. was also conducted and results were presented in a tabulated form. The analysis revealed that all the factors under investigation showed positive relationship and some showed positive correlation with the activity of the consumers on SNSs, especially in seeking opinion or information and passing it to others. The correlation analysis revealed that some social constructs e.g. trust, homophily and normative influence was positively correlated with the consumer’s activity on the social networking sites. Tie strength showed positive correlation with homophily, frequency of communication or contact between the online consumers on social networking sites. Gender showed negative correlation with most of the social factors under study. The results are discussed in light of existing literature on word of mouth marketing and social media marketing. The implications (theoretical, managerial and strategy related) of these results are along with the main findings of the study.

This study empirically examines and attempts to model auditors’ relationships with their charismatic clients. Reviewing the prevailing research on charismatic leadership theories and auditor situation as well as related literature, we posit that the prevailing major models pertaining to charismatic leadership can be applied to extend and refine the current models of auditor acquiescence. After hypothesizing such a model, we design an instrument based on the revised Conger-Kanungo model used by (Su & Huang, 2004) to measure the extent to which auditor identify with a charismatic client. We then use the instrument to directly measure auditors’ attachment to the charismatic client and the threat of this attraction and attachment to auditors’ objectivity. Empirical results from our sample of N=192 auditors in the U.S and Sweden demonstrate that a new improved charismatic leadership model indeed could be emerged and fit to the actual situation of auditors. We specifically find an indication that Client Identification will increase the risk of auditor acquiescence. Combined with Professional identification driving increased the risk of Client identification, Professional Identification appears not to provide the resilience against acquiescence that we hypothesized. Instead the clear direct connection of the charismatic leadership affecting the auditors objectivity warrants study of a model where Client Identification and Professional Identification as mere variants of each other (Clients business just being another profession).

These days’ universities are playing a major role in leading society to more social and economic growth by transferring knowledge to society, as this leads to new firms being created, new products and services injected into markets, and shifts society toward a more knowledge intensive system. This thesis is related to a larger study on Nordic entrepreneurial universities. The study is to be carried out between 2011 and 2013 and is funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond under the management of Professor Bengtsson. The purpose of this study as the first phase of this research project is to increase empirical knowledge regarding three Swedish university cases: Blekinge Institute of Technology, Chalmers University of Technology, and Linköping University and their strategies and structures regarding entrepreneurial policy and activities. The study illustrates that even within universities in the same country there are different unexploited resources and opportunities toward academic entrepreneurship. The study provides useful information about the entrepreneurial activities in three heterogeneous Swedish universities. Keywords: Entrepreneurship, university, strategy, structure, Sweden Paper type: Case study

In the competitive market of Information Technology Maintenance Services, the understandings of the key components affecting sales are important to survive in the market. Centres of Excellence are created with the aim of being a more standardised and cost efficient solution for customer services. Is the quality of the vendor customer administration important in business-to-business sales and procurement situations? Furthermore, does it affect the next sale for the vendor? The overall purpose of this work is to give guidance in terms of how cost saving programs in the customer administration area can affect sales in a long-term perspective. The hypothesis; Past vendor customer administration quality does impact the customer decision to buy again from the same vendor; has been designed to show which key components within customer administration, such as invoices and disputes, impacts the decision.

Purpose: The purpose of this master’s thesis is to study how organizational rewards; intrinsic rewards and extrinsic monetary and non-monetary rewards, affect employees’ creativity and innovation within an organizational environment, and to propose a new categorization of organizational rewards.

Methodology: A literature review of selected peer-reviewed studies from different countries and industries.

Findings: The results of this study support the following notions; (1) intrinsic rewards support employees’ creativity and innovation through their positive impact on intrinsic motivation; (2) extrinsic non-monetary rewards support employees’ creativity and innovation ; (3) extrinsic monetary rewards can support or hinder employees’ creativity and innovation depending on external organizational factors. This study suggests a new model which categorizes organizational rewards into two main groups; monetary and non-monetary instead of extrinsic and intrinsic, and the non-monetary one into intrinsic and extrinsic while the monetary group includes only extrinsic rewards.

Syfte: Identifiera samband mellan risk management och värdering. Metod: Kombinerad metod, både kvantitativ och kvalitativ användes i undersökningen. Analys av teoretiskt underlag ledde till framtagande av faktorer samt mätningar och indikationer som beskriver värdering, risk management och samband. En surveystudie och innehållsanalys genomfördes. Kvalitativ metod användes vid databearbetning och analys. Resultat och slutsatser: Forskning av risk management respektive värdering bör ske inte enbart utifrån de tillhörande ämnena utan även från ett organisationsteoriperspektiv. Mintzbergs organisationsteori är lämplig att applicera på undersökningar både av risk management och värdering. Det ger bättre förståelse av dessa fenomen och förklaring hur de fungerar och kan förutsägas i företagsmiljön. Undersökningen visar att bolagen, oavsett storlek och typ, kan styra val av risk managementtyp och värderingsituation: Små bolag kan välja mellan självstyrande eller mer samordnad riskhantering, stora bolag därmed kan inrikta sig antingen mot att bygga en risk management med stark lednings & teknostruktur eller ha risk management, integrerad i befintlig organisation. Bolagen och dess ledning borde bli uppmärksamma på problematiken kring kunskapsökningsmöjligheter och balansen mellan flexibilitetsbehov och formaliseringskrav vid organisering av arbete med värderingar. Följande risk management och värderingssituationer stödjer och utvecklar varandra: Riskkapitalbolagen som har standardiserade riskhanteringsprocesser förbättrar den flexibla värderingssituationen. Samordnad riskstyrning ökar kunskapen om risker och dess hantering som i sin tur ökar möjligheterna till bättre användning av värderingsverktygen vid värderingar. Samordnade riskhanteringsaktiviteter innebär även att det ställs krav på en viss formalisering av värderingsarbetet. Det skapas en positiv trend då kunskap om nya risker vid värderingar mer formaliseras och bevaras som i sin tur leder till en bättre riskstyrning – koordinering av risk management hos riskkapitalbolag. Den formaliserade värderingsarbetessituationen hos bankerna innebär att kunskap om omvärld, nya risker och värderingsverktyg standardiseras. Varje ny information om nya risker och nya värderingsverktyg tas emot av risk management organisationen som i sin tur kan förbättra koordinering av riskhanteringsprocesser, rapportering samt föra kunskap om risker vidare i organisationen. På så sätt höjs risk managementnivån i hela bolaget. Vidare är standardiserad och integrerad risk management i befintlig organisation den situation som bäst påverkar värderingen. Standardisering av risk managementprocesser, resultat och kunskap innebär stöd i olika risk managementfrågor för hela organisationen, inkluderat värderingsarbete. En mer integrerad risk management organisationsform innebär mindre övervakning och kontroll som är en viktig förutsättning för professionellt värderingsarbetet.

Life for Lebanese women has become one of the most rapidly changing elements in Lebanese society. Women in the Lebanese region can no longer be described as scared, inferior, domestic women who hardly leave their houses. This advancement of women in the workforce in this region can be attributed to factors including women attaining higher education and a greater demand in the job market.This research project measures female manger evaluation on the barriers they face or perceive under organizational culture, organizational practices, organizational networks and interpersonal relationships, mentoring, tokenism, and usage of wasta in organization. In addition, it assesses their views on the role of family and other sources of support in their ability to manage their double role. In addition, the research demonstrates how the Lebanese managers female have high levels of subjective career success. The results showed that the Lebanese female manager in different managerial levels has a highly satisfied and success levels mainly attributed to their satisfaction with the subjective aspects of their careers. Therefore, Lebanese women managers were satisfied with their overall job, the progress they made to meet their career goals, and goals for advancement.

Large companies invest a vast amount of capital and time on R&D annually. With all this financial investment in R&D, it is important that the companies get value for their invested capital. By creating innovations, such as new products and services, involve high risk and will necessarily not lead to successful commercial ends. Many companies lack the competencies in selecting ideas and transform them into value. Knowledge in innovations is affecting companies, especially those that are investing heavily in R&D. The present study explain how value can be created from innovation around the topics of innovativeness, innovation protection and market efficiency, within a large global manufacturing company in Sweden with global operations. A four dimensional measure from a prior study has been the base for the structural theoretical model that has been tested. The authors have divided innovativeness, innovation protection and market efficiency into absorptive capacity (ACAP), open innovation, patents, secrecy, lead time advantages and complementary assets and studied modern literature to find relationships between these and how it affects firm performance. They have also done a survey and interviews to examine the present status in a large manufacturing company. The empirical findings show support for a relationship between ACAP and firm performance, ACAP and success of strategic alliances as well as a relationship between protection of innovation and success of strategic alliances.