Between 2007 and 2013, the number of loans banks provided to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) declined. The purpose of this single case study was to explore the strategies that senior bank lending officers used to improve lending to SMEs. The sample size consisted of 4 senior small business lending officers who have in lending for 5 or more year in Houston, Texas. The conceptual framework used was agency theory. Data were collected using semistructured interviews with 4 senior bank lending officers from a bank in the Houston, Texas area, a review of documents from lending officers, and other artifacts from the Small Business Administration. Data were analyzed with the support of software to generate themes. The data analysis included process coding of the data collected from the participants. Member checking and methodological triangulation enhanced the credibility of the findings in this study. Three themes emerged from the data analysis: the barriers and challenges lenders face when lending to business owners, bankers' strategies to overcome challenges in lending to their customers, and lenders' use of relationships and lending experience to provide loans to their customers. The findings from this study may contribute to social change by providing insights that can be used by senior lending officers related to strategies for providing loans to SMEs. The results of this study may also contribute to increased job creation for local residents, which can positively impact the economic viability of the Houston area.

<p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Date                   </strong>May 28, 2009<strong></strong></p><p><strong>Level                  </strong>Bachelor thesis in Business Administration/Information Technology</p><p><strong>Authors             </strong>Jennie Andersson, Niklas Fridell, Visar Hoxha</p><p><strong>Tutor                  </strong>Marie Mörndal</p><p><strong>Department    </strong>HST</p><p><strong>Title                    </strong>ERP-solutions in small to medium sized enterprises – possibilities and problems</p><p><strong>Summary          </strong>ERP-solutions have penetrated the market for SME: s, offering the same advantages larger enterprises have enjoyed for years. For a significantly cheaper price, SME: s can nowadays acquire ERP-solutions and become more effective and increase their profit.  The authors have examined five SME: s in both the production and service company segment and have come to the conclusion that an ERP-solution would indeed benefit these companies in many levels but also induce certain obstacles the examined companies must overcome, both financial and organizational.</p><p><strong>Purpose            </strong>The purpose of this thesis is to examine if and how SME: s can become more efficient and developed and increase their profit by implementing an ERP-solution. Further, the purpose is to discuss which conditions that exists for the examined SME: s in order to implement an ERP-solution.</p><p><strong>Method            </strong>The thesis consists of a qualitative research where the authors have interviewed either the owner or employees at management level by using semi-structured interviews. The results from the interviews have been analyzed based on the theoretical framework.</p><p><strong>Result                </strong>Several improvement areas have been identified, most typically the processes are lacking efficiency in some areas even if the SME already had an ERP-solution (or similar) or did not have one at all. Most SME: s did lack the financial resources required for an ERP-solution deployment.</p><p><strong>Conclusion      </strong>The findings show that there are development possibilities within the examined SME:s. The biggest revenue improvement would be decreased manual labor and improved processes. An ERP-solution would help the SME: s achieve that since it automates many tasks and are designed with “best practices” in mind. Despite most of the SME:s lacking financial resources for an ERP-solution, there were some exceptions which contradicted the theoretical framework, mainly because they were SME: s but acted under a larger owner/franchise chain.</p><p> </p>

Omvärlden ändras snabbt, vilket sätter press på moderna organisationer. Organisationer kan därför använda sig av Business Intelligence (BI) till att fatta bra och effektiva beslut. Enligt författare till litteratur, skribenter på Internettidningar, och debattörer på Internet, kan det dock vara skillnad på hur BI används i små och stora organisationer, då dessa inte har samma förutsättningar till BI användande (Chang, 2009). Vid påbörjandet av denna studie var det oklart hur SME och stora organisationer använder BI, samt på vilket sätt BI användande i SME och stora organisationer skiljde sig, och vad denna skillnad bestod av. Det fanns alltså kunskapsbrist inom detta område inom BI. För att berika ämnet BI med ny kunskap gjordes därför en studie där BI användandet i SME och stora organisationer beskrevs, samt redogjordes det för de skillnader som upptäcktes mellan BI användandet i SME och stora organisationer. Andra författare hade visserligen skrivit om BI användande i SME, fast de hade inte gjort någon typ av jämförelse mellan BI användande i små och stora organisationer. Även detta sågs som kunskapsbrist. En induktiv ansats med kvalitativ metod användes när empiri insamlades. Fokus var att samla mycket information av bra kvalitet om få enheter, vilket dessa metoder lämpade sig bra till. Totalt intervjuades sex enheter. Fem enheter intervjuades personligt, och en enhet fick svara på enkätfrågor samt intervjuades via telefon. För att kunna beskriva de fenomen som uppstod i empirin utifrån en "BI synvinkel" användes en teoretisk bakgrund när studien gjordes. Den teoretiska bakgrunden beskrev bland annat vad BI är för något, hur det används, varför det används, samt de komponenter och aktiviteter som hör till BI. I diskussionskapitlet redovisades och diskuterades SME och stora organisationers BI användande, samt den skillnad som upptäcktes gällande BI användandet. Dessa resultat kopplades också till den teoretiska bakgrunden för att beskrivas utifrån en "BI synvinkel". Resultaten kopplades även till den tidigare forskning som var gjord om detta ämne för att se vilka likheter och skillnader som fanns. Slutsatserna i uppsatsen tydde på att det inte fanns särskilt många skillnader mellan SME och stora organisationers BI användande. Slutsatserna tydde även på att resultaten inte var generella, då få enheter undersöktes. Resultaten ansågs dock som konkreta då skillnaderna(och likheterna) som faktiskt fanns, framkom tydligt. Slutligen gavs förslag på fortsatt forskning till läsarna och förslag på hur en studie likt denna kan bli mer "generaliserbar".

I en bank måste en kreditbedömning utföras innan ett kreditbeslut kan fattas. Utfallet beror då på om kreditbedömaren har tillräcklig information om företaget och hur pålitlig denna information är. När kreditgivare söker och tolkar information om det kreditsökande företaget använder de sig utav flera källor där kreditgivarens sociala nätverk är en utav dessa källor.  Syftet med denna uppsats är att förklara och analysera om kreditbedömarens sociala nätverk påverkar kreditbeslutet beträffande utlåning till små och medelstora företag, genom en kvalitativ undersökning. Studien består av tre personliga intervjuer som har utförts på Handelsbankens kontor i Höganäs, Varberg och Ängelholm. Med hjälp av vår teori har vi kunnat analysera den empiri som vi har samlat in från våra intervjuer. Vårt samlade resultat av den teoretiska och empiriska undersökningen visar att en kreditbedömare i en småstad utnyttjar sitt sociala nätverk i syfte att samla in information till kreditbedömningsprocessen samt att de använder sig utav nätverket på flera olika sätt. Det sociala nätverket kan även generera personinformation samt ge lokal- och branschinformation som sedan används i kreditbedömningsprocessen.

This study probes into the SME strategic typology evolution at different stage of business life cycle from Resource Base View, and analyzes the factors and incidents triggering the SME strategic evolution. It further infers that as the resource accumulating, visionary leadership cultivating, and movement typology changing, the decision-making process varies. To conclude, the finding of this study are followed: 1.SME strategic typology varies, rather than fixes. This indicates that SEM entrepreneur ought to adopt appropriate strategy by inspecting market/product focus, R-D and managerial skills 2.SEM movements could be divided into three parts: ¡§Action before acknowledge¡¨, ¡§Action with only leader acknowledged¡¨ and ¡§Action with both leader and organization acknowledged. SEM¡¦s Movements adoption changed by resource accumulation, visionary leadership cultivation, decision making reliance 3.SME should adopt distinct decision-making process at different stage in business life cycle.

The study in turnaround situations to small and medium enterprises (SME) in Taiwan Abstract The Taiwan economic in the past thirty years gains a very positive reputation in the world. They said it¡¦s a miracle for such a small territory country shows its powerful activities. There are more than 97% small to medium enterprises in Taiwan. The flexibility and efficiency of the SME impresses us. Recently the world business circumstances changed. A new theory of ¡§Transferable Social Resource¡¨ indicates why many Taiwan manufactory makers move their production line to China. Those local SME has to find a new way to face the challenge of the business circumstance. Each turnaround becomes the important choice of SME. This study is to show the organizational crisis before change, the forces to make changing decision, the process of turnaround, and how the changing influences the special relationship among business net. And we found: 1. Organizational crisis ¢¹ Poor inner management: for example, none participating type organization; the weakness in financial management ¢º External reasons for decline ¢» The poor communications inside the organization, A timing solution of it is important to solve problems, The Prejudice of the CEO in favor of either side will hurt the relationship to worse situation. ¢¼ The confidence between the associates becomes the basic factor to develop the organizational capability. 2. The process of turnaround ¢¹ How to finish the old business ¢º Some CEO may not face the financial problems as an important factor before the changing ¢» The confidence of those financial supporters may become the key point whether it is a successful turnaround. ¢¼ The destructive costs include (1)The request of exchanging by cash. (2) The payments of orders were transferred late. (3) The shortage of cash under certain cases. ¢½ The way SME solve financial problem is to lend money from their relatives or friends. ¢¾ A CEO gave his company¡¦s stock to the key staffs of the company under organization crisis.

Bakgrund: Det finns olika sätt för företag att konstruera sina ledare. Då Emballator Lagan Plast, ett industriföretag i Ljungby, har börjat fokusera på att utveckla sina ledare, fann vi det intressant att studera hur ledare konstrueras i SME-företag och vilka utmaningar SME- företag skulle kunna ha i detta arbete.   Problemformulering: Hur konstrueras ledare i SME-företag?   Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att söka en förståelse hur ledare konstrueras i SME-företag utifrån deras specifika utmaningar och att samtidigt bidra med en förståelse för Emballator Lagan Plasts fortsatta arbete med ledarskapsutveckling.   Metod: I denna studie har vi gjort en fallstudie med en kvalitativ forskningsmetod. Vi har intervjuat och observerat olika arbetsroller för att söka en förståelse för hur ledare konstrueras i SME- företag.   Slutsats: Efter att tolkat det insamlade materialet och följt idéer och föreställningar om ledarskap, har vi fått en förståelse ledare konstrueras i SME- företag via en social konstruktion. / Background: There are different ways for companies to construct their leaders. Since Emballator Lagan Plast, an industry company in Ljungby, has started to focus on developing their leaders, we found it interesting to studying how leaders are constructed in SMEs and which possible challenges SMEs have in this work.    Research question: How are leaders constructed in SMEs?   Purpose: The purpose of this study was to search an understanding how leaders are constructed in SMEs given their specific challenges, together with a contribution to an understanding for Emballator Lagan Plast’s continuing work of leadership development.   Methodology: In this study, we have done a case study with a qualitative research design. We have done interviews and observations on different working positions to search an understanding how leaders are constructed in SMEs.   Conclusion: After interpreted the collected material and followed ideas and conceptions on leadership, we reached an understanding that leaders are constructed in SMEs through a social construction.

This research interrogates a large population of shareholders, senior managers and company directors in New Zealand as to their reasons for considering board service, their competence in governance skills areas, their beliefs as to whether board room diversity is needed and their firms’ interests to recruit further independent directors to their boards. With a considerable deference to the contributions of agency theory as the conventional cornerstone to explain the connection of directors into organizations for the purpose of governance service, this work explores the extension of agency theory by adding an additional driver for governance engagement by company directors: Commitment. Based on this research, company directors in New Zealand appear to base their interest in serving as independent directors on company boards largely on the desire to “do good”. This raises the prospect of a deeper and more meaningful relationship with firms where they serve as directors. Ignorance of this important component of the director/firm relationship by the firms might render directors less willing to contribute and deprive firms of the strong support and engagement of their directors. Lack of recognition of this additional component to the fabric of an enduring committed relationship between external directors and their firms may require a different behavior of firms during the recruitment, board induction training and maintenance of the director relationship. While the strong expression of interest by SMEs in additional independent directors is a welcome sign of rising governance standards in New Zealand’s large group of such enterprises, concern emerges about the potential lack of competence by directors in several areas of governance. While directors appear to compensate for deficiencies in skills with an extra dose of commitment, significant needs for upskilling exists in this sector. It is noted that the absence of well-established, easily accessible and comprehensive director training schemes in New Zealand conflicts with the expected large number of additional independent director recruitments in the near future. Shareholders, senior managers and directors report a need for diversity on boards in the area of business experience, but no specific concern is expressed as to how any specific importance of gender or age while other factors, such as work experience and global knowledge, are of much greater interest. This could indicate that the status quo of only a small number of women on boards in New Zealand is accepted, but in the context of this work more likely indicates that directors will not be recruited (or excluded from recruitment) in the future on the basis of gender. This research attempts to lay groundwork for a more intensive investigation into the true motivations of company directors when they think of an independent director mandate and while they discharge directorship duties. There now appears to be solid evidence that the historic application of agency theory does not completely describe the factors of motivation and relationship under which independent directors serve on company boards.

This thesis contributes to a field of scholarly research that seems to be receiving increasing attention, especially in recent times, although one has to acknowledge that there is still a severe lack of understanding. It is generally believed that the vast majority of research is still focused on large corporations, given their visibility and individual impact on the society, and this is particularly true in the re-search on sustainability and responsibility. In the course of this work, an extensive review of the relevant literature was conducted, including a holistic systematic analysis of a sample of leading small business and entrepreneurship journals, fol-lowed by an in-depth, narrative review based on a much broader selection of articles from various sources. The review revealed that there is little research on sustainability and responsibility in SMEs in Germany and that the vast majority of this research is quantitative in nature. The aim of this research is to, thus, develop an in-depth understanding of the sustainability and responsibility engagement of manufacturing SMEs in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg and, hence, also present and analyse the views of the participants in this research. Manufacturing SMEs were selected as the focal sample as the sector is very important to the regional community and it can be assumed that, given the nature of their operations, they are in some ways engaged in sustainability activities. For this reason, an interview-study with 30 participants from the SME sector was conducted, underpinned by an interpretive research paradigm. The interviewees included owner-managers (OMs) and managing directors (MDs) from a purposively created sample of SMEs. It must be noted that the focus is not on addressing some CSR role models, but on the ‘ordinary’ SME in-stead. The findings of this research are multifaceted. It was found that many SMEs in the sample tend to follow an extreme, long-term perspective based on a special ethos or values, such as fairness, honesty and trust. There seems to be a consider-able reservation towards the business principles of large corporations. The re-search provides an in-depth discussion on various sustainability dimensions identified in the data. This includes embeddedness in the local community, which varies considerably between the participating firms; focus on employees, which tendsto be seen as the most important resource, and caring for them is for most participants an essential point; and engagement in environmental issues, which tends to be of lower importance for participants except in the case of practices that directly lead to positive economic results. Overall, the research identifies that economic considerations dominate the worldview of participants. However, firms are not considered instruments of short-term profits; instead, natural, long-term development of firms is the overall goal. The research additionally finds that some SMEs in the sample are motivated to find a balance between informal and formal management approaches. In total, one can conclude that the behaviour of SMEs can-not be directly considered to be related to the principles of sustainable development. However, the sample firms and their behaviour are definitely closer to a responsible way of doing business in comparison to many large corporations which also tend to affect many SMEs negatively through their market power and price pressure. This research provides an insight into the world of (owner)-managers of SMEs, thus contributing to a field that is currently dominated by descriptive quantitative research in Germany.

This study interrogates the way in which marketing is carried out, or not carried out within a high technology based small business. The business in question was the basis of a case study undertaken over an 18-month period. This researcher aimed to examine how the combination of entrepreneurial, innovative and relationship marketing can be used to successfully go to market and increase turnover. This PhD project aimed to develop both a theoretical conceptual model and a practice-based application of the model for application in the case study company. The research undertaken combined multiple methods of approach including autoethnographic participant observation, in-depth responsive interviews and inquiry from within the case study company as the researcher was fully embedded in the business for 18 months. This combination of these methods enabled an immersive and robust case study, which sat inline with the interpretivist approach allowing the researcher to gain an insight into the social construction of meaning in relation to the marketing practice of the high technology based small business and how such meaning can be used to inform ‘contextual’ theory development. The case study was then examined and explained using an autoenthographic narrative and positioned in three phases to show the progression from no formal marketing marketing to administrative marketing methods through to innovative and entrepreneurial marketing strategies and techniques. The outcome of the case study research has resulted in an adapted practicebased model. This research has informed the development of the 3I’s model and started to show that the weighting of each section may not be equal. The model suggests that market intelligence, marketing innovation and human interfacing used in the correct combination, as suggested by the researcher, can help high technology based small businesses and ultimately businesses in general go to market successfully.