Today’s organisation competes in a fast-moving global marketplace. With technological developments, global communications and demanding customers driving increased competition in most sectors, organisations cannot afford to stand still for long (Holbeche, 2004:32). They exist only when their products and services are sold, and salespeople are usually one of the most important elements of making this happen. Organisations’ fiscal health depends on their ability to drive revenue, but without mastering sales management, revenue can quickly decline. Salespeople need to concentrate on sales, not on responsibilities that pull them in different directions (Bailor, 2004:53). According to Clarke (1998:29), for any company to succeed, the various departments must co-ordinate their efforts and work together. The sales team relies on other departments for support; without sales every other department is worthless. The method of selling has also changed and the days of salespeople carrying briefcases overstuffed with brochures and knocking on every door they can find to drum up interest in their organisations’ products are waning. Today’s professional salespeople co-ordinate the resources of their companies to help solve customers’ problems (Weitz et al, 2004:5). For organisations to succeed in this new environment the right organisational climate is vital to create high performance. This is about making the most of employee talents and accountabilities, and managing performance in ways which unleash, rather than constrain, employee potential (Holbeche, 2004:32). 2 The Long Term Insurance Industry in South Africa had to deal with the changing environment and the introduction of the Financial Advisor Intermediary Service Act of 2002 (FAIS). The traditional principles of successful sales are being challenged in a changing South African insurance industry. Sales managers must rethink their philosophies as the Financial Advisory Intermediary Act (37/2002) regulates the rendering of certain financial advisory and intermediary services to clients and provides for matters incidental thereto. Sales managers can no longer simply motivate financial advisors to achieve targets but should also ensure that all new business is compliant and falls within the new legislation. According to Natenberg (2004:1), sales managers must have a purpose to cope with the added challenges and demands because success comes from purpose. Until a sales manager or financial advisor recognises what needs to be accomplished, there will be a lack of motivation necessary to accomplish anything. Financial advisors burn out easily because they cannot visualise the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Everyone wants a driven, highperformance sales team. However, not all sales leaders know how to achieve that. The problem could be motivation. Many sales managers see money as the answer to their motivational problem but money is not everything. For all their commitment to keep salespeople inspired, sales managers would do well to stop and consider the simple things their financial advisors desire. Only then might sales managers be able to craft programmes or work situations in which sales people can thrive (Gilbert, 2003:30). “Too often people let life pass them by. They try hard to achieve something, but when they do, they ask, “Is this all there is to it?” That is because they never 3 take a moment to enjoy how monumental their achievements are. When you accomplish what you set out to do, be proud” (Natenberg, 2004:1). / Prof. Chris Jooste

M.A. ( Information studies) / Information and knowledge are the new wealth of our time. Knowledge is a resource that is valuable to an organisation's ability to innovate and compete. As every business has to operate in an increasingly competitive and dynamic environment, business managers should base all decisions on their competitive standing in the world economy and the competitiveness of their knowledge competencies. The ability of a company to mobilise and exploit its intangible and invisible assets has become far more important than investing and managing physical, tangible assets ...

The subject of the diploma thesis is financial analysis of commercial insurance company. The diploma thesis is separated into two parts - theoretical and practical. The theoretical part describes financial analysis in general - users of information, sources of information, methods of financial analysis and then the attention is aimed to the specificity of insurance companies - accounting statements, methods and special ratios of financial analysis. The practical part is focused on the financial analysis of concrete insurance company.

Essa dissertação trata da atuação das companhias de seguros no Brasil entre os anos de 1889 e 1914. Busca-se apresentar a ampla inserção dessas companhias na economia brasileira de então; contata-se que para além da concessão de seguros, essas firmas tiveram ativa participação financeira, concedendo crédito e financiando o Estado brasileiro por meio da contínua compra de apólices da dívida pública federal. Buscou-se enfatizar a transição de uma dinâmica mercantil para outra financeira, comprovada para as companhias de seguros sobretudo a partir da década de 1890, e mostrar como a atividade seguradora no Brasil de então foi influenciada pelas novas condições do capitalismo global. / This dissertation deals with the performance of insurance companies in Brazil between 1889 and 1914. It seeks to present the wide insertion of these companies in the brazilian economy; it is concluded that in addition to the insurance concession, these firms had an active financial participation, granting credit and financing the Brazilian State through the continuous purchase of federal public debt policies. We sought to emphasize the transition from a commercial to a financial dynamic, proven by insurance companies especially since the 1890s, and also show how the insurance activity of that time was influenced by the new conditions of global capitalism.

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Los microseguros son una herramienta de gestión que permiten controlar los riesgos a los que se encuentran expuestas las pequeñas y medianas empresas. Debido a la baja penetración de este producto en el mercado de seguros, se pretende analizar los factores que influyen en la limitada demanda, como la falta de canales adecuados de distribución, informalidad de pequeñas y medianas empresas (no bancarizadas), falta de difusión y escasa cultura de seguros, así como una tarificación acorde a las necesidades del mercado meta. El objetivo es impulsar la penetración de microseguros desde una perspectiva socio-económica que brinde al usuario la protección de su patrimonio frente a situaciones adversas, logrando que las pequeñas y medianas empresas se integren en el mercado de seguros. Esto será viable en la medida que se difunda la educación financiera y la cultura de seguros a través de los distintos programas que promueve la Superintendencia de Banca y Seguros y entidades privadas. La estrategia de distribución es uno de los factores claves que va a permitir la captación de asegurados y lograr una mayor recaudación de primas. Con el crecimiento de los microseguros, las compañías aseguradoras tendrán la responsabilidad de analizar su oferta mejorando el diseño del producto y adecuándolo a las necesidades del mercado. / Microinsurance is a management tool that allows controlling the risks to which small and medium-sized companies are exposed. Due to the low penetration of this product in the insurance market, it is intended to analyze the factors that influence the limited demand, such as the lack of adequate distribution channels, informality of small and medium enterprises (unbanked), lack of diffusion and poor insurance culture, as well as pricing according to the needs of the target market. The objective is to promote the penetration of microinsurance from a socio-economic perspective that provides the user with the protection of their heritage in the face of adverse situations, achieving that small and medium-sized companies are integrated into the insurance market. This will be viable to the extent that financial education and insurance culture are disseminated through the different programs promoted by the Superintendence of Banking and Insurance and private entities. The distribution strategy is one of the key factors that will allow the capture of policyholders and achieve a higher premium collection. With the growth of microinsurance, insurance companies will have the responsibility to analyze their offer by improving the design of the product and adapting it to the needs of the market. / Trabajo de Suficiencia Profesional

Abstract not available

<p>Syfte: Noggrann undersökning vad som ligger bakom detta samarbete, motiven, vilket inte framgås av de öppna källorna. Hur man har tänkt långsiktigt, kommer denna trend att hålla i sig och i så fall hur kommer det utvecklas med bl.a. utlands expansion. Jag har en egen hypotes att det eventuellt är en konspiration bakom det hela. Och även undersöka varför en del banker avstår från sådana verksamheter/allianser.</p><p>Metod: Data har samlats in genom de öppna källor, bankerna och försäkringsbolagens hemsidor, pressmedelanden från en rad olika tidningar för att få försöka få en bild hur den aktuella bilden ser ut. Den empiriska delen är gjord av intervjuer av korrespondenter på ledande personer från Handelsbanken, Swedbank, Folksam och Danske Bank. Därefter har jag kopplat vad som har sagts i empirin med relevanta teorier.</p><p>Resultat & slutsats: Motiven för samarbete och verksamhet är ganska enkla. Det är rena strategiska beslut om konkurrens och marknadsandelar. Det är två olika modeller som man går efter för att följa trenden, ena är egen verksamhet som Handelsbanken och den andra är samarbete som Swedbank och Folksam. Banker som inte har gått in i trenden som Danske Bank inte tycker att försäkringsverksamhet är någon naturlig del av den ordinarie bankverksamheten.</p><p>Förslag till fortsattforskning: Banker med inte någon verksamhet, varför exakt man inte har det, några särkskilda motiv. Och jämföra med hur det ser ut i andra länder och framför allt varför det ser ut så. Vad kommer att hända om en utomlands expansion sker? Hur kommer det att utvecklas?</p><p>Uppsatsens bidrag: En utomlands expansion är viktig i samband med försäkringsverksamheten. Framförallt hur man kan lyckas med bägge verksamheter. Generellt så tror jag att både banker och försäkringsbolag kommer att ha nytta av studien.</p> / <p>Aim: An accurate investigation about what is behind this cooperation, the motives which is not clear from the open sources. How have one thought in the long term, will this trend hold on and in that case how will it develop with, for example an expansion to oversees. I have a hypothesis that there is a possible conspiracy behind this. And also investigate why some banks choose to not be apart of these activity/alliances.</p><p>Method: The data has be collected from the open sources, the banks and insurance com-panies homepages, press, and a number of various news papers to get an current picture. The empirical part has been made by interviews from the correspondents from leading people in Handelsbanken, Swedbank, Folksam and Danske Bank. And thereafter have I connected this data to relevant theories.</p><p>Result & Conclusions: The motives behind this activity and cooperation are pretty sim-ple. It is pure strategic decisions whom have been made about competition and market shares. There are two different models that the banks follow to because of the trend. One is an own activity like Handelsbanken, and the other is a cooperation like Swedbank and Folksam. Danske Bank who has not been apart of the activity as yet, don’t think that the insurance activity is an obvious part of the ordinary bank activity.</p><p>Suggestions for future research: Banks who does not have any insurance activity, why exactly don’t they have it, is there any specific reason and then compare to how it is in other countries, why it is in a certain way, and if has shown a positive or negative effect. What will happen if an expansion takes place abroad and how will it develop?</p><p>Contribution of the thesis: An expansion abroad is important in relation to the insurance activity, and how to succeed with the both activity. I think both a bank and insurance company will have a benefit of this study. Here the author will discuss how the thesis has contributed to new knowledge for different interested parties. By contribution it is meant the expected usability of the conducted thesis.</p>

Work motivation has most often been defined operationally as job satisfaction, but this dimension has shown to be unrelated to job performance. Therefore, a new measure of work motivation defined as willingness to work was developed. Two main questions were investigated in this thesis. Three work groups were included in the studies. The first purpose was to explore willingness to work and related variables for two groups, people employed in pre-schools (Study1) and employees of an insurance company (Study 2). The variance in willingness to work was explained to 59% for the pre-school employees, and to 69% for the employees in an insurance company. Work interest, affective organizational commitment, perceived competence and risk burden were predictors of willingness to work in both of the groups. Other factors related to willingness to work in this study were, for the employees in pre-schools, positive evaluation of the job, normative organizational commitment, general intrinsic motivation and accepted risks. Additional factors that contributed to the explanation of the variance in willingness to work for the employees in an insurance company were job satisfaction, spontaneous creativity, work environment and opinions about one’s job. A second purpose was to investigate the construct validity of willingness to work dimension by examining its relationships with absenteeism, number of hours worked, intention to quit, and job performance. In Study 1 and Study 2, the relationship between absenteeism, number of hours worked, intention to quit and willingness to work was examined. The result showed that willingness to work was strongly related to intention to quit and number of hours worked in both of the studies. The relationship between willingness to work and job performance (subjective and objective) was also investigated. Participants in this study were insurance sales people. The correlation of willingness to work and objective as well as subjective job performance was quite high (r=.41 and .57, respectively). According to the results, the work motivation measure could be considered as being a quite valid assessment of work motivation. / Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögsk., 2001

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