Magister Commercii (Industrial Psychology) - MCom(IPS) / As organisations struggle to meet the demands placed on them by contextual challenges, they place more emphasis on relationships for effective organisational functioning. Trust is a critical component of workplace relationships and has been linked to numerous beneficial organisational outcomes. However, as trust is difficult for organisations to influence directly, Perceived Organisational Support may encompass a set of actions organisations can take that directly create workplace trust. The aim of this study was to elucidate the relationship between workplace trust and Perceived Organisational Support. Workplace trust was examined as a three-dimensional model, with the trust referent (Organisation, Immediate Manager, Co-Workers) forming each dimension. Perceived Organisational Support was examined as a two-dimensional model, based on performance-reward expectancies (“Contribution”) or socio-emotional need fulfilment (“Well-being”). A multi-method survey methodology yielded n = 212 participants in a South African organisation. The consolidated questionnaire sought biographical information from the sample as well as their responses to the Workplace Trust Survey and the Survey of Perceived Organisational Support. The reliability coefficients of the Workplace Trust Survey, Survey of Perceived Organisational Support and each of the dimensions were established as sufficient. Next, Confirmatory Factor Analysis confirmed that a three-dimensional factor structure for workplace trust and a two-dimensional factor structure for Perceived Organisational Support can and should be used in a South African sample. Correlation analysis indicated a significant, positive relationship between each dimension of workplace trust and both of the dimensions of Perceived Organisational Support. Regression analysis confirmed that Perceived Organisational Support contributes to a significant proportion of the variance in workplace trust. However, there was one exception: The Contribution dimension of Perceived Organisational Support did not contribute significantly to Trust in Co-workers. This research, based on a South African sample, confirms much of the previous international research into the relationship between Perceived Organisational Support and workplace trust. In addition, it makes two new contributions to the field. First, it found that Perceived Organisational Support can and should be considered a two-dimensional construct in a South African sample. This is in contrast with international studies that indicate a uni-dimensional construct for Perceived Organisational Support. Second, by using the two-dimensional Perceived Organisational Support construct, it found that only the Well-being, and not the Contribution, dimension of Perceived Organisational Support had a significant, positive impact on workplace trust. Recommendations are made for future research, based on limitations of the current study as well as on the research results.

Corporate Social Responsibility has become an increasingly important aspect for companiesto consider. Partly because it attracts customers and investors, and partly because societyplaces higher demands on companies to act as good citizens. Research has shown that anadditional effect of CSR work is that it can create a positive attitude among employees.Employees’ motivation to work can depend on a number of different factors, such as beingable to participate in and contribute to the decision-making process. The purpose of the studyis to investigate the relationship between organizations’ CSR work and employees’ workmotivation. Furthermore, the study looks into how the employees’ work motivation isaffected by the opportunity to influence the CSR work. The survey is a qualitative case studyof the organization Husqvarna and its results are based on interviews with employees and ananalysis of the company's documents. Its theoretical framework consists of George Homans’social exchange theory, Anthony Giddens’ structuration theory and Pinder and Lathamsmotivational framework. The results of the study show that CSR policies can contribute towork motivation. However, employees’ personal opinions of CSR work in general are ofgreat importance for how they value CSR policies. Moreover, the results suggest that theopportunity to participate in the CSR work is a motivating factor for most employees, eventhough organizational hierarchy and lack of time were described as obstacles. The studyreflects on whether these obstacles are what make some employees indifferent to CSR work. / Corporate Social Responsibility-arbete har blivit en viktig komponent för företag. Dels då detattraherar kunder och investerare, dels då samhället ställer högre krav på företag att agerasom goda samhällsmedborgare. Forskning har visat att en ytterligare effekt av CSR-arbete ärdess skapande av en positiv inställning hos interna aktörer såsom anställda. Ytterligareforskning har däremot visat att anställdas inställning rörande CSR-arbete är komplext ochvidare behöver undersökas. Anställdas inställning och motivation till arbete och sinorganisation kan bero på ett flertal olika faktorer, där bland annat möjlighet till deltagandevisat sig ha betydelse. Syftet med studien är att undersöka förhållandet mellan organisationersCSR-arbete och de anställdas arbetsmotivation. Vidare undersöks hur de anställdasarbetsmotivation påverkas av den möjlighet som finns att medverka till och påverkaCSR-arbetet. Undersökningen är en kvalitativ fallstudie av organisationen Husqvarna ochdess resultat utgår från intervjuer med anställda samt från en analys av företagets dokument.Dess teoretiska ramverk består av George Homans sociala utbytesteori, Anthony Giddensstruktureringsteori samt Craig Pinder och Gary Lathams arbetsmotivationsram. Homanssociala utbytesteori bidrar till ökad förståelse i huruvida företagets CSR-arbete i sig kan ökamotivationen hos en anställd. Ett socialt utbyte i ett tvåpartsförhållande (såsom företaget ochden anställde) innebär att parterna söker jämvikt och gör detta genom att återbetala. Giddensstruktureringsteori förklarar hur möjligheten till att vara en aktör med möjlighet att delta ochpåverka strukturer (såsom CSR-arbete) kan öka arbetsmotivationen. Pinder och Lathamsarbetsmotivationsram beskriver att anställdas arbetsmotivation består av individuellavärderingar, behov, egenskaper och kognition. I studiens resultat framkommer attCSR-policys kan bidra till arbetsmotivation. Dock är anställdas personliga åsikter av viktgällande vilken grad CSR-policys påverkar arbetsmotivationen. Vidare antyder resultatet attmöjlighet till deltagande är en motivationsfaktor. Även om de anställda upplever möjlighettill aktörskap, uppgavs vissa hinder till att delta i CSR-arbetet. Studien reflekterar över omdessa hinder för anställda att kunna vara aktörer kan vara det som gör att somliga anställdablir likgiltiga inför CSR-arbetet.

This study investigates host community attitudes towards tourism in South Tyrol’s Puster Valley in Italy along with predispositions against the emerging phenomenon of overtourism and explores the factors influencing its formations, as similar research in the same European context with a more mature tourism industry is still underdeveloped. Applying quantitative methods, data was collected through an online survey between May and June 2021. A total of 17 attitude statements were analyzed using IBM’s SPSS and the results indicate that tourism impacts in the valley are perceived evenly throughout the whole community while it was proven with Social Exchange Theory that people involved within the tourism industry are less inclined to perceive negative impacts. Choosing the Pragser Wildsee as a case, the analysis further reveals that overtourism is not only affecting residents in its vicinity put has more far-reaching consequences. Even the results not being very surprising, the study is confirming tourism-related issues and suggests more need in investigating resident attitudes in similar environments.

Purpose – This study has two different purposes. First, we aim to understand and describe the new phenomenon of extreme openness within the area of open innovation by answering the following question: How can this new concept of extreme openness within the Fuzzy front-end be understood and described? The second purpose of this study is to investigate how Fuzzy front-end activities can be held at a distance by answer the following question: Which technology-based communication can facilitate distance-based Fuzzy front-end activities? Method – This study was conducted as an abductive single case-study of the Fuzzy front-end process where extreme openness is performed at a multinational conglomerate company. Interviews have been held with both employees at the case company as well as external actors.  In total, 41 interviews were conducted, where 35 were unique respondents. The results were generated through the use of thematic analysis.  Findings – The findings from the study are summarized in two different frameworks in which the first framework explains the phenomenon of extreme openness and gives insight into why and how large companies provide innovation power to external actors. The second framework illustrates which communication technologies to use in the Fuzzy front-end process and provide necessary information about needed functionality and criteria when having Fuzzy front-end activities distance-based.  Theoretical and practical implications – The study provides implications for research on open innovation by empirically explicating the new phenomenon of extreme openness and connect the open innovation literature with the social exchange theory. Our findings reveal that business-to-business relational exchange can result in future benefits and that top managers can use this strategy to build long-term relationships and achieve financial improvements. Further, we also provide implications into the research on the Fuzzy front-end by empirically clarifying functionality and criteria that are specifically needed when having these activities distance-based. Our result provides implications relevant to both top managers and project managers. Limitations and future research – The study is limited by a single case study of the new phenomenon of extreme openness and which communication technology to use in distance-based Fuzzy front-end activities. We recommend future research to validate and extend findings from this study in new contexts.

This study aims to identify the perceived socio - cultural impacts of tourism by residents in the city Cesky Krumlov. Based on data from questionnaire survey five main spheres (factors) within socio - cultural impacts were named with reference to the social exchange theory according residents' positive or negative perception during interaction with tourism. According the average answer in each sphere, the cluster analysis produced four types of typology of final attitude - the Advocates, Skeptics, Environmentally Concerned and Not decided. After identification all attitudes, two main problematic spheres were named - socio-cultural and social status as they are seen as the most negative ones. This fact was supported by accompanied survey of businesses and companies structure in the city center, where the results show lack of businesses for residents.

M. Tech. (Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Management Sciences), Vaal University of Technology. / Apart from the contribution and success of the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) through job creation, poverty alleviation and economic growth, there are still organisational factors such as organisational politics and job stress, which hamper the success of these enterprises. The aim of this study was to examine the influence of organisational politics on job stress among SME employees in Matlosana Local District. The target population concentrated on SME employees within Matlosana Local District in North West province, with the population size of N=431 respondents. A quantitative approach was applied, with the use of a cross sectional survey (questionnaire) to gather information on general political behaviour (GB), get ahead (GA), pay and promotion policies (PP), time stress (TS) and anxiety (AX). Data analysis was conducted with the use of the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 25.0 and the Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) version 25.0. A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was applied in examining and testing the relationships between observed constructs and their causal latent constructs while Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was used to test the hypothesised relationships between constructs. The findings of the study revealed that there is a positive and significant relationship between organisational politics and job stress. The findings also emphasised that organisational politics is considered as a hindrance-related stressor that hampers the proper functioning of individual employees. This study concludes that organisational politics are the social ills of every organisation, it is upon the management of the SMEs to apply good human resource management policies to curb the politics. Contrary, if the organisational politics are not managed well, it will result in impacting the job outcomes such as job stress.

Three ongoing trends are the background for this study: the aging population, the large retirements and the challenges of skill supply, which are particularly pronounced in the public sector. Partly because of the large retirements, the public sector is currently experiencing recruitment difficulties combined with increasing demand for healthcare services. The increasing demand for healthcare services, high number of retirements and challenges of skill supply causes professional groups such as assistant nurses to be particularly exposed to increased strain. Significant factors proposed to solve current and future recruitment needs is an extended working life with economic incentives for additional years of labour market participation. However, previous studies have also shown that workers become increasingly heterogeneous as they age, suggesting that an individual approach to older workers are necessary. Therefore, this study seeks to create a deeper understanding of the work-related needs of older assistant nurses, and how individual agreements can improve work-related fit. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with older assistant nurses working in elderly care. Results indicated that the needs of the occupation govern the working conditions, and risk creating an imbalance between resources and work requirements. Different perceived working conditions combined with individual health-related aspects were identified as causing heterogeneous work-related needs, affecting the basis for a prolonged working life. Through individual agreements between manager and employee, it has instead been identified to enhance work motivation, therefore promoting both willingness and ability to postpone retirement. The results have particularly shown that agreements in tasks and schedules can improve the work-related fit and contribute to an extended working life. However, the complexity of individual agreements has also shown to be a risk of injustice among employees. Therefore, it places high demands on the development of age management strategies and policies, but also on managers in terms of the implementation and design of individual agreements.

Organizations are today working actively with diversity management in alignment with the regulations from Riksdagen to reduce discrimination against employees based on their "Gender, transgender identity or expression, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation and age". Previously most focus has been put on the surface-level attributes of diversity such as age, gender and ethnicity but more emphasis and concern should be put on the deeper-level diversities such as personality. Scholars have stressed the importance of conducting qualitative studies that examine the deeper-level diversities in relation to diversity management. Moreover, there is an explicit need for investigating the effect that such a linkage between personality and diversity management can have on employee engagement levels. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether diversity management can be developed by looking at people’s personalities. This is achieved by answering the research question: How could an understanding of diverse personalities improve employee engagement? By examining this question, this study will give insight to whether personality is an aspect companies should consider in their diversity management when trying to understand and enhance employee engagement. By analyzing seven individuals at two international companies, located in Sweden, we were able to investigate a single case deeply and collect their subjective realities. Further, the study has taken a qualitative research approach in which seven semi-structured interviews were held and the empirical data was later derived through the use of a thematic analysis. It has been found with the application of the Five Factor Model (FFM) that the employees' personalities have a connection to their engagement levels. The analysis implied that the employees' personalities rather than surface-level diversities had an impact on their engagement. This makes it in turn reasonable to suggest that companies' diversity management practices can be further developed if looking at their employees' personalities. Ultimately this thesis has derived salient conclusions about the fact that FFM could be used to develop the understanding of diversity and diversity management. In turn this contributes with insight on how workplaces and the well-being of employees can be enhanced.

This Master thesis examines the role of resident empowerment in rural nature tourism in shaping the relations between how residents engage with local places and local nature stewardship in Plouguerneau, France. Through a conceptual framework that includes the concepts of empowerment, place attachment, care for nature, and nature stewardship, the study models the effect of place attachment and care for nature on resident stewardship attitudes and how resident empowerment in tourism mediates this relationship. The theoretical underpinnings of social exchange theory (SET) and nature’s contributions to people (NCP) theory are employed to provide a comprehensive understanding of these relationships. The study employs a mixed-method approach, including online and door-to-door surveying. To analyze the results, partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used. The findings suggest that place attachment is not a significant predictor of empowerment through tourism or nature stewardship as only place identity was predicting political empowerment and environmental citizenship. This finding challenges the assumption that strong place attachment necessarily leads to empowerment from tourism and nature stewardship. Therefore, it highlights the need for a more nuanced understanding of the factors that motivate residents to engage in environmentally responsible behaviors. The results also show that care for nature is significantly predicting both empowerment from tourism and nature stewardship. Furthermore, the study reveals that tourism can be a powerful tool for empowering local communities and enhancing their sense of responsibility towards the environment. Specifically, the findings suggest that involving residents in tourism decision-making processes can promote their engagement in environmental citizenship. Overall, this thesis contributes to our understanding of how tourism can contribute to local nature stewardship in rural communities by empowering residents to take an active role in caring for their natural environment.

Bakgrund och problemformulering: Skiftet till digitala banktjänster innebär ett annat arbetssätt att bibehålla förtroendet hos sina kunder då servicen blir mindre personlig. Förtroende och service är en viktig del hos kunderna samtidigt som det ställs nya krav gällande bekvämlighet och automatiserade självtjänster. Mot denna bakgrund är möjliga problem som kan uppstå en bristande säkerhet samt riskerna kring integriteten.  Syftet: Studiens syfte är att undersöka om det finns ett samband mellan kundernas förtroende och bankernas digitala banktjänster. Utöver detta vill forskarna få en förståelse för bankkunders förtroende för sin digitala bank.  Metod: Undersökningen bygger på kvantitativ metod i form av en enkätundersökning som sedan används för att genomföra en korrelationsanalys och regressionsanalys. Teoretisk referensram: Technology Acceptance Model, Social Exchange Theory, Perceived Risk och Digitala Tillitsmodellen. Empiri: Empirin har fyra olika fokusområden: kontrollfrågor, förtroende, digitala banktjänster samt risk och säkerhet. Dessa sammanställs och testas i en korrelationsanalys och regressionsanalys för att undersöka samband och testa hypoteser.  Slutsats: Resultatet visar att det föreligger ett positivt samband mellan digitala banktjänsters användbarhet och förtroende för digitala banktjänster samt att upplevd integritetsrisk har ett negativt samband med förtroendet. Trots att det kan finnas ett samband mellan digitala banktjänsternas användarvänlighet och förtroende finns inte tillräckligt med stöd för att bevisa detta. / Background and problem formulation: The shift to digital banking services means a different way of working to maintain the trust of its customers, this as the service has become less personal. Trust and service are valued highly for the customers, while new demands are being made regarding convenience and automated self-service. Against this background, possible problems that may arise are a lack of security and the risks surrounding integrity. Purpose: The purpose of the study is to investigate whether there is a relationship between customers' trust and the banks' digital banking services. In addition to this, the researchers want to gain an understanding of bank customers' trust in their digital bank. Method: The survey is based on a quantitative method in the form of a questionnaire which is then used to carry out a correlation and regression analysis. Framework: Technology Acceptance Model, Social Exchange Theory, Perceived Risk and Digital Trust Model. Empiricism: The empiricism has four different focus areas: control questions, trust, digital banking services and lastly risk as well as security. These are compiled and tested in a correlation and regression analysis to examine relationships by testing hypotheses. Conclusions: The findings show that there is a positive relationship between the usability of digital banking services and trust in digital banking services, and that perceived integrity risk has a negative relationship with trust. Although there may be a link between the ease of use of digital banking services and trust, there is not enough support to prove this.