Everyday ideas are born that change the world, ideas that beat the high-risk market of entrepreneurship. Relating to the question, what gives way to an optimal market establishment? The purpose of the thesis is to provide information related to what type of methodologies that contribute to the endeavours of a startup to successfully create a product that serves the markets needs. Achieved through careful and qualitative assessments of relevant sources in an abductive approach. The empirical findings from an observed startup serves as the basis for research, subsequently correlated and defined through scientific findings of the methodologies of the business model canvas, minimum viable product, and Lean Startup Methodology. The foundation of observations revolves around the startup company Swift, whose vision is to eliminate the risk of discrimination in the job-searching process through innovate and technical measures. Furthermore, quantitative data was gathered to assess the applicability of this study to the general startup market. The analyses of the startups utilization of the methodologies indicated flaws revolving human bias factors of interpreting data, and the effects of presenting minimum viable products to the market could effect the market establishment, relating to the customer perception within the innovation- spectrum. Conclusively, by utilizing methods that optimize multi-variable understanding, and continuous feedback by customers to validate market related hypothesises; give way to higher chances of an optimal product-market-fit.

The thesis examines the Children’s Centre Programme in England and develops an understanding of its development at national and local level by using Kingdon’s (1995) streams model. Central to the thesis is a case study of the Children’s Centre Programme which looks at influential factors in the development at national level and implementation of the programme in one local authority. Traditionally Kingdon’s (1995) model has been used to understand the way that a wide range of factors interact to enable policy change at national level but a small number of authors have also used the model at local level showing that the range of factors that impact on the local implementation of a policy are also many and varied. One of the most well know aspects of Kingdon’s model is in showing how the problem, policy and politics streams come together to create a window of opportunity which allows or drives policy change and or enactment. This thesis will use the model in a broader sense showing that although this window of opportunity is important the interaction of the three streams is ongoing and not only does it lead to significant policy change but it also informs debates and policy development on an ongoing basis.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 30-November 02, 1995 / Riviera Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada / This paper suggests possible applications of telemetry as a cooperative measure in potential, future arms control agreements related to missiles and space launch vehicles (i.e., an agreement leading to clarification of the ABM Treaty for theater missile defense, and a notional regional or global ban on ground-launched, theater-range missiles). The opportunities for telemetry as a cooperative measure in future international arms control agreements should certainly grow, as confidence and appreciation in its utility are realized from the on-going ballistic missile telemetry exchanges between the US and Russia in START implementation.

Parenting is one of the most salient influences in children's development, particularly during early childhood. Substantial theoretical and empirical evidence has linked sociodemographic risk to compromised parenting, and has contributed to the development of two-generation programs to support low-income parents and their young children. Despite decades of research on these families, little is known about how styles of parenting change across time, how children's emotion regulation influences parenting styles, or how risks predict longitudinal stability and change to parenting. Furthermore, it is unclear how one two-generation program, Early Head Start, promotes positive parenting styles and buffers against contextual risks. The aim of the three papers in this dissertation study is to describe maternal parenting within a low-income sample, by linking longitudinal trajectories of parenting to contextual risks, Early Head Start, children's emotion regulation (ER), and risk for child maltreatment. Guided by the bioecological model, and components specific to the Ecological-Transactional Model of Child Maltreatment (Cicchetti et al., 2010), these three papers indicate specific risks that are most salient to exhibiting unsupportive parenting behaviors: family conflict, maternal depression, and attitudes and beliefs that indicate risk for child physical abuse. Furthermore, the papers highlight important methodological considerations for the study of parenting at risk, children's ER, as well as for clinicians assessing risk. The three papers, collectively, highlight the complex interplay of determinants of parenting, including sociodemographic characteristics, psychological factors, interpersonal relationships, child effects, family-level characteristics, and Early Head Start involvement.

This thesis aims to better understand the process of the funding of young innovative ventures, and how a deeper understanding of this process can help public policy to better stimulate entrepreneurial firms—especially in high-technology industries. I interpret entrepreneurial finance broadly to mean financing issues facing young innovative ventures. It includes three essays which deal with a set of economic, institutional, and public policy issues to examine entrepreneurial finance.

<p>PROBLEM DISCUSSION: Vaggeryd is a small municipality Småland. In addition to its</p><p>strategic position along the main traffic route E4, Vaggeryd is very interesting also because</p><p>of its advanced view on growing of the business sector, in both short and long-term per-</p><p>spective.</p><p>To meet that goal the municipality of Vaggeryd started to invest in “Egenföretagareutbildningen”</p><p>EFU in cooperation with Jönköping International Business School (JIBS). The</p><p>main idea is that students attend the courses that are held by JIBS and during their studies start their own business in a local business incubator called Fenix.</p><p>PURPOSE: To host such education requires a huge amount of energy and resources from</p><p>the municipality, which consequently would like to get answers to questions like “Is it worth investing in the education?” or “What are the results of such education?”</p><p>The aim of this paper is to give the answers to those crucial questions though I believe that</p><p>the time that has passed from the beginning of the education is too short and that the</p><p>number of the students was not large enough to get definitive answers.</p><p>This paper concentrates on a narrow part of the qualitative research methods – an inter-</p><p>view. It is divided into two parts, a theoretical part and the empirical findings.</p><p>FINDINGS: The research showed that six students out of a total of ten from generation 2005 started a new venture, three will take over a family business, and one has not decided</p><p>to start a business yet. Of six students in generation 2003 four have started a business and one of them finished in bankruptcy, one plans to start a business in the future and one does not have a good business idea.</p><p>RECOMMENDATIONS: Answers that the interviews returned gave interesting sugges-</p><p>tions to both the municipality of Vaggeryd and JIBS about how to improve EFU. I would</p><p>emphasise two, I believe, the most important recommendations. First municipality has to</p><p>attract neighbouring municipalities in the EFU project. In addition, a greater effort should be made to help students build a spider’s web of business contacts.</p>

This paper explores the factors related to demand for craft beer and whether there is a specific stereotype of craft beer drinkers that aligns with this demand. Using regression analysis on data from all 50 states, this paper concludes that there is a significant correlation between the number of organic farms, colleges, and 55-64 year olds and the number of craft breweries in a state, suggesting that there is evidence that craft beer drinkers tend to be eco-friendly. The paper then goes on to briefly discuss certain production, distribution, and expansion strategies.

The emergence of closed-loop Brayton cycle power plants, such as the PBMR, resulted in the need to simulate start-up transients for industrial multi-stage axial flow compressors operating at subsonic conditions. This implies that the delivery pressure and power requirements must be predicted for different mass flow rates and rotational speeds while operating in the first and fourth quadrants on the compressor performance charts. Therefore, an analytical performance prediction model for subsonic multi-stage axial flow compressors had to be developed that can be integrated into a generic network analysis software code such as Flownex. For this purpose, performance calculations based on one-dimensional mean-line analysis demonstrated good accuracy, provided that the correct models for losses, incidence and deviation are used. Such a model is therefore the focus of this study. A preliminary analytical performance prediction code, with the capability of interchanging between different deviation and loss models is presented. Reasonably complex loss models are integrated in association with the correct incidence and deviation models in a software package called "Engineering Equation Solver" (EES). The total pressure loss calculations are based on a superposition of theoretically separable loss components that include the following: blade profile losses, secondary losses and annulus losses. The fundamental conservation equations for mass, momentum and energy for compressible "rotating pipe" flow were implemented into the performance prediction code. Performance prediction models were validated against experimental data and evaluated according to their ease of implementation. Verification was done by comparing simulation results with experimental work done by Von Backstrom. This includes a calculation to determine the uncertainty in the experimental results. Furthermore, since the conventional definition of isentropic efficiency breaks down at the boundaries of quadrants on the performance charts, a new non-dimensional power formulation is presented that allows for the calculation of the compressor power in all of the relevant quadrants. Good comparison was found between simulation results and measurements in the first and fourth quadrant of operation. / Thesis (M.Ing. (Nuclear Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.

Sure Start Children’s Centres and their predecessors, the Sure Start Local Programmes, were central to New Labour’s drive to reduce social exclusion through early intervention in the lives of families with young children. Where previous research predominantly focused on the impact and effectiveness of programme delivery, there has also been a great deal of emphasis on those families who do not use these services. However, in attempting to understand why parents do not use Children’s Centres, the approach has been one that placed non-participation experiences away from Centres, distanced and unrelated. This thesis presents a sociological analysis of two Children’s Centres where the institutional processes and practices that shape what these spaces mean are explored in depth. In exploring some of the day to day interactions and practices, this thesis challenges some of the taken for granted assumptions, in order to create a meaningful space for dialogue. Using an ethnographic methodology two Centres were studied to explore how Children’s Centres were perceived by those who used them, those who work in them and those who walked past them. The fieldwork was conducted over an eighteen month period and involved a multitude of methods; participation and observation in Centre activities, focus groups with staff, and parents and interviews with parents within and outside Centres. I also had many ‘conversations with a purpose’ with parents in community toddler groups and other spaces that parents, predominantly mothers occupy with their young children. What emerged was that an understanding of these spaces is complex and whilst invaluable to a small number of very regular users they are also insignificant to others. For other users the plurality of meaning reflects the many ways that these spaces are occupied by parents and children. Points of tension were apparent as parents made these spaces their own, sometimes in conflict with how they ‘ought’ to be used. The thesis uses the work of Foucault to explore how power relations are played out within the Centres and the way that government operates at a distance. From this perspective it is clear that Children’s Centres are political spaces, where they have become ‘depoliticised’ as part of the disciplinary processes of the ‘conduct of conduct’. They are spaces where ‘technologies of government’ are employed in practice and where the drive to evidence outcomes focuses practitioners’ attention on end results. As a result the processes, the means to achieving those results, can go unexamined.

The assessment of children’s social-emotional skills, especially in the preschool years, is essential, as it yields early identification of problems and allows for appropriate interventions to be tried. School psychologists and other professionals use a variety of assessment methods (e.g., observations, interviews, behavior rating scales) to determine a child’s social-emotional abilities. Two popular behavior rating scales used frequently by professionals are the Behavior Assessment System for Children-Third Edition (BASC-3) and the Child Behavior Checklist 1.5-5 (CBCL 1.5-5). The current study examines the consistency of results from the two instruments. Fifty-six Head Start teachers from two regions of the country completed both the BASC-3 and the CBCL 1.5-5 at the same point of time while thinking of a specific student who displays behavioral concerns. The findings revealed that most of similarly named scales from the two instruments correlated significantly. However, 40% of those comparisons resulted in significantly different mean scores. Approximately half of the comparisons resulted in adequate classification consistency (i.e., either average or clinically significant). Overall, the findings imply that the two instruments do not always measure similarly named behavioral constructs in a consistent manner.