The pension fund industry affects an enormous proportion of the world population and consists of more than $20 trillion of assets globally. Hence the performance of pension funds has major effects. This thesis investigates the performance of personal pension funds in the UK, one of the leading pension industries in the world. It identifies two important factors that are largely overlooked in the related literature: fund’s age and management outsourcing. Based on the ‘career concerns’ argument by Holmström (1999), it tests whether fund performance is age dependent, and in particular, whether funds perform better when they are young than when they ‘mature’. Moreover, one of the major features of the pension fund industry has been the enormous growth in management outsourcing. This thesis addresses this issue and tests whether there are differences in the performance between outsourced and internally managed funds, and investigates potential determinants of the decision to outsource. It argues that a ‘fashion to outsource’ may be partially responsible for the trend. Given that a CAPM-APT based analysis is not appropriate for the data at hand, the thesis employs three alternative performance measures, two of which utilise fund-specific benchmarks. The results show that risk-adjusted returns are statistically insignificantly different from zero but funds significantly outperform their benchmarks. Performance is found to change with fund’s age but this relationship is more complex than a simple ‘career-concern’ argument would predict. Risk-adjusted returns of the internally managed and the outsourced funds are both indifferent from zero but the outsourced funds are better at outperforming their benchmarks. Lastly, there is some evidence of a ‘fashion to outsource’. This research is novel in several ways. It provides the first detailed investigation of the performance of the UK personal pension funds. It is the first to address the question of potential factors (other than managerial characteristics) that may explain fund performance. It discusses the rise of outsourcing in the industry and analyses differences/similarities between performance of the outsourced and the internal funds. Finally, it is the first to investigate whether the rapid increase in outsourcing is due to ‘fashion’.

Several studies have reported various challenges ballet dancers experience in their performance careers. However, to date, very little research has been done to understand how professional ballet dancers persevere in their performance careers in the face of the demanding nature and various challenges associated with their career. The purpose of this study was to explore perseverance of professional ballet dancers in their performance career from the perspectives of retired professional ballet dancers. Using a social constructivist lens, the research question addressed in this study was: How can professional ballet dancers persevere in a performance career? Narrative interviews were conducted with participants (N = 9) who had danced at one or more professional ballet companies for at least one year and had been involved in the ballet world since their retirement from their performance careers. A thematic analysis was used to analyze the data and 4 themes were identified about persevering as a professional ballet dancer in a performance career: (a) Building and Looking After Your Healthy Sense of Self and Mental Attitude; (b) Navigating Your Career Journey With Intelligence and Courage Within and Beyond One Ballet Company; (c) Growing as an Artist to Have More Than Technique and Raw Physicality to Capture an Audience; and (d) Balancing Your Performance Career by Having a Life Outside the Dance World. Implications of the findings for research, practice, and counselling are discussed. / Graduate / 2020-04-26

This master´s thesis deals with the evaluation of employees and their personal development in the company STUDENT AGENCY, s.r.o. The current situation of this part of personnel management is evaluated on the basis of questionnaire survey among company employees. An integral part of this work are proposals and recommendations leading to increased efficiency of personnel work in the field of evaluation and employees development.