Problem: How is Lean, a production-focused model being applied to non-productive focused industries. Purpose: To examine how Lean has been applied to the department of Turbuhaler-Kvalitetskontroll and which parts have been successfully applied. Problem statement: How does the implementation of Lean’s basic concept, which originated in the car industry, differentiate itself from the implementation of Lean in the pharmaceutical industry, in this case the department of Turbuhaler-Kvalitetskontroll at AstraZeneca. Conclusions: The department has had success in its implementation of lean. They have developed and modified the basic concept in order to apply it and excluded the parts they did not consider necessary. Through their work they have accomplished numerous improvements in, among other things, the reduction of lead time.

The present study aims to investigate the phonological development of typically developing monolingual Swedish speaking children aged three to four years. The result could be used in the standardization of a new phonological test material for clinical speech and language pathology assessments. One-hundred and thirty four children aged three and four years (73 girls and 61 boys) were assessed with the new material. The children were tested in kindergartens in three communities in southeastern Sweden. Their assessments were audio recorded, transcribed phonetically and analyzed with Percentage Phonemes Correct (PPC) and Percentage of Words Correct (PWC). An analysis of speech error patterns of substitutions of phonemes, reduction of consonant clusters and word structural deviations was conducted. The data recorded from the children were divided and analyzed in four semi-annual intervals and two annual intervals. The result shows a clear developmental trend with children in the older age group having a higher PPC and PWC than the younger children. Significant differences were found between the groups in annual intervals. Significant differences could only be demonstrated between the youngest age group and the other groups at semi-annual intervals. No significant gender differences were observed. Most of the errors of individual phonemes and consonant clusters among children in all age groups were distortions rather than substitutions, but the younger children simplified consonant clusters more often.

The aim of the present study was to examine students' text comprehension in grades 4 and 6. Participants were 61 students without documented or suspected reading and writing difficulties, in grades 4 and 6. The focus was on texts designed by Bishop and Adams (1992), containing two types of questions: literal and inference questions, and three different ways of presenting the text; listening, silent reading and silent reading with the text available when responding to the questions. The texts have been previously used in research and as a tool for clinical, qualitative estimate of reading comprehension in speech and language pathologists’ assessments. Investigation was also conducted for working memory, vocabulary, and phonological and orthographical decoding. The results show that students have a significantly higher score in terms of literal questions when the text is available in responding to the questions, versus listening and silent reading. The results also show that literal and inference questions do not differ. No differences between gender and grades were encountered. Conclusions are drawn that students with typical reading development in grades 4 and 6 do not have any difficulty in answering neither literal nor inference questions, concerning the three texts in this study.

När kraven från omvärlden ökar hittar organisationer nya sätt att vara såväl det mest effektiva som det mest legitima företaget. Detta gäller gentemot kunder, anställda, konkurrenter och samhället i stort. Syftet med denna kandidatuppsats är att med hjälp av nyinstitutionell teori undersöka hur ett kommunalt bostadsbolag jobbar med arbetsmiljö. Fokus ligger på att belysa hur arbetsmiljöarbetet samverkar med legitimitetsskapande faktorer, exempelvis standardisering av arbetsmiljöarbetet. Kandidatuppsatsen är en kvalitativ studie och utgörs av dokumentstudier samt intervjuer. Genom att koda materialet kunde våra frågeställningar besvaras. Våra slutsatser är att bostadsbolaget har ett antal rutiner som pekar på att ett systematiskt arbetsmiljöarbete bedrivs. Vidare utför bostadsbolaget enligt oss en stor del av sitt arbetsmiljöarbete för att upprätthålla sin legitimitet, även om en viss del även utförs av effektivitetsskäl. Införandet av en standard skulle inte nödvändigtvis förändra det praktiska arbetet i någon större grad, men ge ett ökat fokus på arbetsmiljöarbete vilket i sin tur skulle kunna förbättra arbetsmiljöarbetet i organisationen, möjligtvis till priset av ökad administration. / When demands of the surrounding world increase organizations find new ways to be the most effective and legitimate. This applies to customers, employees, competitors and society as a whole. The aim of this bachelor thesis is to investigate how a public housing company1 handle issues concerning the work environment. The focus of this paper is to illustrate how the occupational safety and health work interacts with legitimacy-building factors, for example standardization. To explain this, we use neoinstitutional theory with its concepts we find relevant. This bachelor thesis is a qualitative study, consisting of document studies and interviews. By encoding the material our three initial questions were answered. The conclusions suggest the public housing company retain systematic routines when working with occupational safety and health. Further, according to us, the company executes a large part of their occupational safety and health work in order to maintain its legitimacy, although some is also carried out for reasons of efficiency. The introduction of a occupational health standard would not necessarily cause significant change in the organization's daily work routine, but give an increased focus on occupational health and safety work, which in turn could improve the work environment of the organization. 1 Note that "public housing" in Sweden (allmännyttiga bostadsbolag)not is reserved for people under a certain income level. This form of housing tenure makes up 20% of all homes in Sweden.

Lean manufacturing is a term that we have been hearing very often in many sectors and areas. Lean started as a manufacturing system and philosophy that was first developed by Toyota using key production principles that were introduced by Henry Ford. After successful implementations and great results in quality, cost and service levels, lean is now considered as a business system or as a culture. Lean principles and tools are widely used in every step of an entire process, from customer service to supply chain management. Although there are a lot of success stories about lean implementations, many companies are also struggling to adapt their culture towards the implementation of lean principles. In this thesis, standardization of lean manufacturing is studied and an analysis is provided to discuss if standardization would help eliminate the major obstacles that hinder successful lean implementation. Potential benefits and disadvantages of having standards for lean enterprises are analyzed. As a part of the research a survey was conducted to get feedback from lean professionals about standardization. The survey results suggest that there is an overall support for lean standardization. However, there are both positive and negative views about the potential benefits and disadvantages of using lean standards as an implementation guide. A case study is also provided to measure the benefits of lean and to understand how lean standards may help companies implement lean principles. Based on a simulation model that was develop to verify the benefits, a 15 % reduction in inventory carrying cost and a 5% reduction in total queue time was predicted.

The brand building process is investigated by looking at the strategy of a small to medium-sized fashion company, Hunky Dory AB. According to the model presented in this thesis, the brand building process consists of five stages; product attributes, brand identity, positioning, marketing communication, and distribution. These stages are investigated separately to see whether standardization, adaptation, or a contingency approach is used at each stage. It is found that Hunky Dory mainly standardize, or aim to standardize, the stages in their strategic brand building process across international markets. However, adaptation is to some extent necessary or inevitable in the stages product attributes, marketing communications and distribution. The only exception is a variable in distribution, the choice of stores, which is adapted to what suits the local market. In conclusion, Hunky Dory pursue a mix of standardization and adaptation, which supports the contingency perspective.

The aim of this research is to analyse how adaptation / standardisation, trust and network development counter the challenges created by intangibility and heterogeneity of service in the case of Philippine Gamma Knife Incorporated. This research used qualitative data that were gathered through unstructured interviews, direct observation and documents. The adaptation / standardisation, trust and network facilitate service visibility and decrease heterogeneity of a health care service. Among the variables adaptation / standardisation signifies an important role; however, trust manifestation was concluded more significant compared to network in a cultural environment such as that found in the Philippines. Moreover, culture was found to be an important role in the development of adaptation / standardisation, trust and network processes.

Immateriella tillgångar har blivit allt viktigare i en globaliserad värld med stora företag som investerar och agerar i olika länder. En viktig immateriell tillgång är varumärken. För att kunna värdera ett varumärkes värde finns det flera finansiella metoder. En ny standard, ISO 10668 Requirements for monetary brand valuation, utgavs av ISO (International Organization for Standardization) 1 september 2010. Syftet med denna standard är att på ett tillförlitligt sätt kunna värdera varumärken under sin uppbyggnad, vid eventuella tvister samt vid ett företagsförvärv. Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka hur de inblandade parterna i harmoniseringsprocessen av ISO 10668 har arbetat fram en enhetlig standard genom olika konflikter, beslut, samarbeten och kompromisser. Uppsatsen baseras på åtta intervjuer (med personer som varit inblandade i utvecklingen av standarden) samt två dokument. Resultatet som denna uppsats kommer fram till är följande:   Att standarden ämnar till att vara enhetlig genom bland annat transparens krav som möjliggör att en värdering kan granskas av en extern part. För att utveckla denna standard har arbetsgruppen bestått av skilda professioner (konsulter, revisorer, marknadsförare och jurister) för att täcka in olika delar som standarden innehåller (legala, beteendemässiga och finansiella analyser). Att det har funnits vissa konflikter och kompromisser för att möjliggöra standardens existens. Konflikter har varit rörande för många finansiella metoder samt definitionen av varumärke. Kompromisser har utgjorts av att inkludera vissa metoder samt en hopskrivning av varumärkes definition. Detta har även lett till vissa grupperingar och till att ett land röstade mot standarden. Att standardens bidrag är tidigare finansiella värderingsmetoder med att koppla dessa med en legal och beteendemässig analys.   Om denna standard är en enhetlig standard för varumärkesvärderingar tål att diskuteras. Detta eftersom att ett problem som existerat med varumärkesvärderingar är att det finns åtaliga metoder för att värdera ett varumärke på. Standarden är en hopskrivning av tidigare finansiella metoder med en legal analys och en beteendemässig analys. / Intangible assets have become increasingly more important in a globalized world of big companies that invest and operate in different countries. An important intangible asset is trademarks or brands. To evaluate a brand's value, there are several financial methods. A new standard called ISO 10668 Requirements for monetary brand valuation was published by ISO (International Organization for Standardization) September 1st 2010. The purpose of this standard is to evaluate in a reliable way brands in their construction, during possible litigation and in mergers & acquisitions situations. The purpose of this paper is to examine how the parties involved in the process of harmonization of ISO 10668 has developed a uniform standard by various conflicts, decisions, collaboration and compromise. The essay is based on eight interviews (with individuals involved in the development of the standard) and two documents. The results of this paper are the following:   The standard intends to be standardized by including transparency requirements that enable an evaluation can be audited by an external party. To develop this standard, the working group consisted of different professions (consultants, accountants, marketers and lawyers) to cover different parts of the standard contains (legal, behavioral and financial analysis). That there have been some conflicts and compromises in order to allow standard's existence. Conflicts have been on too many financial methods and the definition of brand. Compromises have included the inclusion of certain techniques and a new definition of brands. This has also led to the creation of internal groupings and that one country voted against the standard. The standard contribution is a linking of former financial valuation methods with a legal and behavioral analysis.   If this standard is a standardized for the brand valuation ​​is worth discussing. One problem that has existed with brand valuation is that there are numerous methods for valuing a brand. This standard consists of former existing financial methods with a legal analysis and a behavioral analysis.

ABSTRACT Title: Services Marketing in a Cross-Cultural Environment – The Case of Elekta in Russia Level: Final assignment for Master Degree in Business Administration Authors: Alena Bazyleva and Maria Zaytseva Supervisor: Dr. Maria Fregidou-Malama Aim: The aim of this research is to investigate how the products and services of the Swedish company Elekta are marketed in Russia, a country with cultural environment different from Sweden. For this purpose such aspects of marketing strategy as adaptation/standardization, trust and network development, which help to decrease the influence of intangibility and heterogeneity of services, are examined. Method: In present research explanatory applied type of study was used to describe services marketing process. Combination of induction and deduction methods, and qualitative methods of research were used. Case study of Swedish company Elekta was chosen as the research area. Primary data was collected through survey by means of semi-structured interviews and open questionnaires. Secondary data was collected from sources such as relevant books, scientific articles, company brochure, and websites of company and its clients. Results and conclusion: The research reveals that trust, network building, balance of adaptation and standardization strategies, employed by Elekta company, help to overcome heterogeneity and intangibility of its services in Russian market. It has also been found that the image of Sweden as a country of origin plays an important role in trust establishment in Russia, but in a sense that it is a foreign country, not Sweden in particular. Moreover, it is suggested, that organizational structure of international company, matrix structure in this particular case study, favours the development and effectiveness of the discussed variables. In spite of such characteristics of Russian market as high bureaucracy, corruption, “blat” network, unstable laws, etc., this market is considered to be a promising emerging market for international business. Russian national culture displays large power distance, high uncertainty avoidance, collectivist and feminine values, which influence the whole society and the business sphere as well. Suggestions for future research: It would be beneficial for future research to expand the range of complementing studies, examining the cases of Elekta in different countries and emerging markets in particular. In addition, in order to develop international services marketing theory, it is necessary to include other services industries in the scope of research. Furthermore, getting feedback from the patients, who experienced treatment on Elekta equipment, can contribute to the future research. Contribution of the thesis: The modification and adaptation of the theoretical framework of Fregidou-Malama and Hyder (2011) made by authors of this study contributes to the theory of international services marketing process. In addition, as there is lack of research in this area for health care sector, this study can be valuable addition to this research area. Research of the case of Elekta in Russia complements the range of studies on international services marketing process in health care sector with the cases of Elekta company in different countries: Egypt, China, the Philippines, Brazil, Hong Kong. Besides, current research has certain practical value: it is beneficial for international companies expanding into emerging markets in general and in Russian market in particular. This research may help to increase awareness about Elekta treatment solutions. Key words: Elekta, Gamma Knife, Russia, Services Marketing, Services characteristics, Network, Trust, Adaptation, Standardization, Culture, Organizational structure.

Background: Health economic evaluations are becoming an increasingly important means of analysing which care alternative resource utilisation is the most cost effective. It is a new topic in the medical device industry that causes much uncertainty and unstructured use of the actors involved. Study questions: Why is it difficult to develop, implement and disseminate this standardized health economic evaluation models in medical technology? Is there a possibility to standardize health economic evaluations within the medical device industry? Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the standardization issues for health economic evaluations within the medical device industry. Method: A qualitative approach was used in the form of interviews with five actors that are active or have a connection to the medical device industry. The data collection consists of journals, reports, Internet searches and literature among other things. Conclusion: It is possible to standardize, but with certain restrictions such as the county council's budget, influence of industry-specific factors, lack of knowledge and the important interaction between actors.