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Title: Selection of Local and Expatriate Managers of MNEs in the Post-Entry Phase Authors: Rebecka Nilsson and Tilda Nithenius Level: Master thesis, 30 HP Keywords: Post-Entry Phase, Managerial Selection Strategy, Foreign Activities, Multinational Enterprises, Local Manager, Expatriate Manager     Background: The internationalization of companies contributes to competitive advantage as well as challenges for the companies. In foreign activities enterprises exist in different phases, which might have an impact on the management requirements. This makes the strategy of managerial selection relevant because it will ease the overall foreign activities.     Research Question: Which are the underlying factors that influence the selection of host-country managers in the post-entry phase?   Purpose:The purpose of this study is to develop the understanding for companies’ managerial selection strategies in the post-entry phase. In addition, the purpose of this study is to develop a model that will work as a theoretical guideline for managerial selections.   Theoretical Framework:Theories of firms’ internationalization process, different phases for companies that operate internationally and challenges for companies operating abroad, are presented. Further theories of managerial selection, international human resource management and management of international companies are discussed.     Methodology:This study is made with a qualitative research method and a multiple case-study design, with an abductive approach. Eight Swedish companies operating in China were interviewed through semi-structured and low standardized interviews. The respondents from the companies are top managers operating in China.   Findings:There are three underlying factors; trust, knowledge gap and legitimacy, that influence the managerial selection of host-country managers in the post entry-phase. Each underlying factor is indirect influenced by different factors. The underlying factors are also all influenced by an overall factor, social capital. This study implies that the selection of managers, except top managers, changes in the post-entry phase compared to the entry-phase as they recruit host-country nationals.

AUTOSAR was created as a standard software infrastructure to be able to fulfill a very large amount of requirements. These days, more and more OEMs are trying to introduce AUTOSAR in their products. Since there are a large amount of diagnostic IDs needed in the Engine control unit and also a huge effort is necessary to configure the ECU, it is very much important to have a tool to generate some parts of the Engine Control Unit software, most importantly the diagnostics software. Diagnostic Communication manager is one such AUTOSAR module which deals with a huge amount of diagnostic data identifiers. Also at BEG, In the actual Non-AUTOSAR Bosch Automotive software, there are a number of different features that are needed and expected in the future AUTOSAR software. The aim of this thesis is to develop a tool that successfully introduces AUTOSAR in the BEG projects with all the necessary features and that is best in terms of Usability, Maintainability, and Improvability. This tool has to generate the complete AUTOSAR Diagnostic communication manager software with all the necessary features. The work can be divided into two parts. The first part includes a complete analysis of the existing tools that are used to generate configuration files and code. Then, List out all the possibilities of each tool, find their advantages and disadvantages and compare each of the tools, either individually or as a combination of tools. This is followed by documenting the choice of best way to generate AUTOSAR DCM with all the necessary features. In the second part, the implementation is carried out. After the best tool is chosen, the implementation of the features for that particular tool is planned accordingly so that it generates the DCM software. Implementation is made and then it is tested with the existing test bench.

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Inledning: Forskning avseende ledarskap och chefskap består av en djungel av teorier och dess diskurs är splittrad. På 1990-talet skedde kraftiga reformer inom offentlig sektor i syfte att göra den offentliga sektorn mer lik den privata. En ökad grupp av äldre och omfattande reformer har gjort chefernas arbete inom branschen mer komplex. Massmedia har framställt en bild av att äldreomsorgen under 2000-talet har befunnit sig i en stor kris i takt med den ökade privatiseringen och utvecklingen av New Public Management, vilket i sin tur ställer högre krav på cheferna. Syfte: Studien vill skapa förståelse för hur chefer inom äldreomsorgen ser på chefskap respektive ledarskap samt på krav som kan kopplas till deras roll som chefer. Studiens ambition är att ur ett individperspektiv bidra med en större förståelse för de krav som ställs på dagens chefer och komplexiteten i samband med deras chefskap. Metod: Tolkande förhållningssätt med en kvalitativ ansats, där semistrukturerade intervjuer använts för att samla empiri. Resultat/Slutsats: Chefskap och ledarskap som begrepp har genomgått omfattande förändringar. Chefskapet har blivit mer komplext i och med att rollen har förändrats och kraven har ökat. Detta till följd av ökade regleringar och kontroller i sviterna av New Public Management som till stor del kännetecknas av administration. Trots en distinkt skillnad mellan ledarskap och chefskap dras slutsatsen att krav finns på att dessa roller ska samverka och i ökad grad kommer att behöva göra det. Viktiga element i chefspositionen i enlighet med respondenterna är; coachning, motivering och stöttning av medarbetarna vilket motsvarar deras definition av ledarskap. Utifrån detta går det att dra slutsatsen att det idag inte längre räcker att agera som en traditionell chef som styr utan i chefskapet ska också ledarskapet inkluderas. / Introduction: Managership and leadership science is a jungle of theories with a fragmented discourse. Severe reforms during the 20th century was implemented with the purpose of making the public sector more similar to the private one. An increase in the number of elderly combined with several reforms has resulted in more demands put on the management. During the 21st century media portrays a crisis within the geriatric care due to increased privatization and the development of New Public Management which in turn place greater demands on the leaders within this sphere. Purpose: This paper aims to create an understanding of managership and leadership within the geriatric care from a management perspective. The results may contribute to a greater understanding of the demands put on today’s leaders and the complexity related to their managing from an individual perspective. Method: An interpretive and qualitative approach using semi-structured interviews Results/Conclusion: Managership and leadership as a concept has undergone extensive changes. Increased responsibilities and demands has made managership more complex. This is due to increased regulations and controls as a result of New Public Management which in turn has led to an increased number of administrative duties. Despite a distinct difference between managership and leadership the paper concludes that it exists demands these roles should interact and also increasingly will need to do it. According to the respondents essential elements for a manager is: coaching, motivating and supporting of the employees, which represents their definition of leadership. Consequently, it is possible to conclude there is no longer enough to act as a traditional manager which only controls but in managership should also the leadership be included.

The purpose of this thesis was to develop and test a causal model of Texas city manager policy role orientation. The first chapter contains a selective review of major works concerning the city manager and the council manager plan. From these works, research perspectives and variables thought to affect managerial policy behavior were identified. A policy role orientation typology was constructed from nine role questions. Four "types" of managers were identified. After a review of the characteristics of the Texas council-manager cities and managers surveyed, the analysis of the isolated variables was carried out. A causal model of managerial policy role orientation was developed and the predictions and assumptions were tested. Further study was indicated, due to the model's failure.

The purpose of this study is to define more clearly the task of the city manager by examining the following perceptions of his role: 1) The city manager perceives himself as being an administrator, leaving the political realm to the city council. 2) The city manager is a policy-maker perceiving that his job includes providing objectives and goals for council and community. He uses his knowledge and experience to create an atmosphere within which various alternatives can be presented with full and free discussion of these alternatives. 3) The role of the city manager cannot be defined along the lines of two mutually exclusive statements. The job of the manager includes a combination of both administration and policy-making.

Dynamic changes taking place in the energy and water industries are bringing with them new and different demands on business specialists and managers of enterprises. These developments, together with an emerging, demographically induced shortages of specialists call for an industry-focused realignment of academic business education and training. This will require curricula geared to both recent scientific findings in various disciplines and the current and future needs of the energy and water industries for specialists and managers. So far, the latter have hardly been studied systematically. The present study fills this gap.

Millions of people around the world consider project management as their major task in their profession, yet the demand for project managers is still increasing. To face this demand many organizations use consultants as project managers for their projects. However, the literature in project management tend to ignore potential differences between internal project managers and consultants as project managers. This thesis is written on commission for LKAB which is a Swedish mining company who conduct around 60-80 projects yearly. Projects at LKAB is managed by internal professional project managers, internal line-managers and consultants as project managers. Despite having three different categories of project managers LKAB has little knowledge about potential differences in how they manage projects. Thus, the purpose of this thesis is to make a case study on project managers at LKAB in search to answer our research question: How do internal project managers, line-workers and consultants manage projects differently? To answer our research question we developed a theoretical frame where we present research which we suggest have given an answer towards the previously discussed question if project leadership has a direct impact on project success or not. Research has found that project leadership has a direct impact on project performance which we consider crucial since it impact the relevance of our study. In our theoretical frame we also present research in outsourcing, project planning and organizing, education, perspectives in project management and theories of project management competencies and skills. There are two perspectives in project management, task perspective which focus on achieving the project objectives and the organizational perspective where they emphasize the relationship between the temporary organization and the permanent organization where main focus is to create value for the receiving organization. To gather data we conducted nine semi-structured interviews in Kiruna with three line- mangers, three internal professional project managers and three consultants which has been hired as project managers by LKAB. We found support to a previous study which showed that project managers have different perspectives towards project management. Furthermore, we found a connection between the project managers perspective and how they prioritized between project goal or effect goal. Project managers with an organizational perspective consider the effect goal to be more important than the project goal and vice versa. We also found that line-managers as project managers do not plan their projects, or manage risk in the same way as professional internal project managers or consultants.

Diversity has entered the leadership arena, as it has all other aspects of life. As we prepare leaders to lead in a more diverse world and train managers in the skills needed to succeed in a competitive society, we must understand what managers’ activities consist of and how leadership styles differ. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the activities of Chief Executive Officers in businesses from a variety of sectors, document differences in male and female leadership styles, and compare these findings with previous studies. Data were collected through observation and creative interviews with three female and three male CEOs, one of which was a minority. The CEOs had been employed in his or her position for at least two years, and the organizations were diverse, successful, and well-known. Observation notes, dialogue and creative interviews were analyzed using Glaser and Strauss’s (1967) constant comparative method. Variety, brevity, and fragmentation were found in the activities of a contemporary manager, and attitudes toward scheduled breaks, interruptions, outside activities, outside businesses, reflection, communication, technology, and identity were found to be similar between male and female leaders. The CEOs tended to value the importance of breaks, have tolerance for interruptions, participate in outside activities, and establish outside business relationships. Also, they tended to value reflection, have informal and formal ways of sharing information with employees, have been impacted for the better by technology, and have a multi-faceted identity. Additional qualitative and quantitative research was recommended to further explore how studies can help prepare leaders by understanding the activities and leadership styles of contemporary managers.