There is a revolutionary change in the world of work that impacts on the individual, work and society. The future of work suggests flexibility, boundary less communities and change in work, as we know it today. As the world of work changes from a worker intensive industrial society towards an automated information society, the retention of technological advantages e.g., human, intellect and knowledge capital is no longer assured. Employers struggle to retain their valuable high technology employees due to a general shortage of experienced candidates and aggressive recruitment tactics by others in the high technology arena. The purpose of this study is to investigate specific retention factors that induce organisational commitment and can thus increase the retention of high technology employees. High technology industries operate in volatile market and experience accelerating growth and rates of change. High technology employees are educated, have a strong preference for independence and hold a large portion of the organisation's intellectual capital. A core belief in human resources is to retain and develop employees to obtain a competitive advantage. In order to retain these valuable employees it has become necessary for organisations to transform from using an employee controlling to a more employee commitment driven strategy. To gain employees' commitment to the organisation and increase retention, the employer needs to identify which retention factors induce organisational commitment. Compensation, job characteristics, training and development opportunities, supervisor support, career opportunities and work/life policies were identified as the top six retention factors in the content analysis done on high technology literature. Organisational commitment has been defined as a mindset, which ties the individual to the organisation. Different forms and foci of organisational commitment are discussed with the approach developed by Meyer and Allen's three component model (1991). The consequences of organisational commitment benefit the organisation in terms of increased job performance, intention to stay, increase in attendance, loyalty, decrease in turnover, greater creativity, more co-operation (particularly across discipline specialities), more volunteerism and more time devoted to productive work on behalf of the organisation. This study focused on a 100% South African owned telecommunications company based in the Gauteng province. A questionnaire was developed and a population of 94 telecommunications professionals, technicians and associated professionals were selected to investigate the influence of various identified retention factors on organisational commitment. The statistical analysis of the data culminated in a regression analysis that measured the significance and the strength of the relationship between the identified retention factors and organisational commitment. The main conclusions were that compensation, job characteristics, supervisor support and work/life policies were significantly related to organisational commitment. On the other hand, in this study training, development and career opportunities were not related. High technology organisations are not just interested in the retention of employees but also creating a mutually beneficial interdependence with employees. The identified retention factors might serve as a means to demonstrate the organisation's support for, or commitment to, their employees and in turn cultivate a reciprocal attachment by employees. Employees' organisational commitment is related to their belief that the identified retention factors are motivated by the desire to retain good employees and to be fair in the treatment of employees. Future research needs are discussed. / Dissertation (MCom (Human Resources Management))--University of Pretoria, 2004. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

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Denna studie syftar till att undersöka vilka möjligheter till lärande genom lärtillfällen (”opportunities to learn” [OTL]) elever ges i mellanstadiet i att utveckla statistisk litteracitet. Statistisk litteracitet beskrivs av forskare som en viktig förmåga för individen som demokratisk rättighet för att, i den allt mer digitala värld vi lever i, kunna föra och följa statistiska argument och kunna fatta välgrundade beslut utifrån statistisk information. I tidigare forskning framkommer det att undervisning i matematik inte sällan baseras på läromedel. Därav görs i denna studie en kvantitativ innehållsanalys av tabeller och diagram i fyra olika läromedelsserier genom årskurs 4–6. Frågeställningarna som avser ge resultat är (1) I vilken omfattning får eleverna möta uppgifter inom de olika nivåerna av statistisk litteracitet i läromedelsserier? samt (2) Hur ser fördelningen och progressionen av nivåerna ut genom årskurs 4–6? Läromedlen analyseras genom Curcios fyra nivåer för kategorisering av statistisk litteracitet. Nivå 1 (N1) “reading the data”, nivå 2 (N2) “reading between the data”, nivå 3 (N3) “reading beyond the data” och nivå 4 (N4) “reading behind the data”. N1 och N2 är de grundläggande nivåerna som innebär att frågorna leder till direkt avläsning, beräkningar eller jämförelser som explicit är uttryckt i datan. Nivåerna N3 och N4 innebär frågor som leder till att dra slutsatser som inte explicit uttrycks i data genom kritisk granskning, förutspå eller generalisera utifrån statistisk information. Kategoriseringen visar att fördelningen av uppgifterna är inom N1 och N2 samt att en tydlig progression saknas i läromedelsserierna. För att utvecklas att bli statistiskt litterat behöver man ges tillräckligt med OTL inom alla dessa nivåer. Studien fann däremot att 99,7% av uppgifterna totalt kategoriserades inom de lägre nivåerna, N1 och N2. Detta kan tolkas som att läromedlen inte ger elever tillräckliga OTL i att utveckla statistisk litteracitet vilket kan påverka elevernas förutsättningar att fatta välgrundade beslut i sin vardag.

Thesis (MBA)--Stellenbosch University, 2012. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Entrepreneurship is important to the growth of economies across the world. The businesses surveyed in this report are affiliated to the Western Cape Business Opportunities Forum and were winners and finalists in the Businessperson of the Year Competition. The Western Cape Business Opportunities Forum (WECBOF) was created to facilitate business opportunities and exposure for black and coloured people in the Western Cape. The Cape Flats have played an important role in the economy of the Western Cape in part as a result of an abnormal internal migration over the last 50 years. This population movement was the result of coloured people being affected by specific policies passed by the government of the time, in particular the Group Areas Act (Republic of south Africa, 1950). Through an analysis of empirical data this research project endeavours to facilitate a better understanding of the way in which entrepreneurs operating in small and medium business enterprises affiliated to the Western Cape Business Opportunities Forum (WECBOF) achieved success or ended in failure. This analysis hopes to contribute to the body of knowledge relating to entrepreneurship development in South Africa and in particular within the Western Cape. This research project adopts a statistical analysis approach by means of a questionnaire to examine the issues that relate to the success factors of entrepreneurs affiliated to the Western Cape Business Opportunities Forum. The results are presented in tabular format.

This dissertation studies the reaction of trading behavior of investors, especially institutional investors, to the public information in Taiwan. Two kinds of public information are chosen in this dissertation. One is open-ending closed-end funds under the regulation set up by Taiwan authority. The other is the change of stocks in MSCI Taiwan Index that is decided by Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI), a well-known foreign institution in constructing various indices. Consistent with earlier studies using U.S. data, our results show that open-ending is a wealth-enhancing event for shareholders. We also provide evidence of the existence of noise traders in the closed-end fund market. The evidence is derived from the trading behavior of domestic institutional investors and small individual investors, who ignore price discounts when open-ending is imminent. The trading by noise traders impedes price adjustments to the discounts, and provides profit opportunities to arbitragers. Furthermore, we show that foreign investors gain considerable wealth, largely at the expense of domestic institutional investors and small individual investors, in the open-ending process. On average, their gains account for 30% of the total gains associated with open-ending, or NT$562 millions per case. On the issue of the change of stocks in MSCI Taiwan Index, we find that MSCI prefers to select the securities with good performance, high liquidity, and large firm size into MSCI Taiwan Index while tends to drop the securities with poor performance, lower liquidity, and small firm size from MSCI Taiwan Index. Besides, consistent with the previous studies, prices increase (decrease) significantly for stocks added to (deleted from) the MSCI Taiwan Index after the announcement date. As well as the deletions, the price decreases for unchanging stocks after the announcement date. However, there is no evidence to find that foreign investors have information advantage in MSCI news over domestic investors. Foreign investors increase (decrease) their holdings on stocks included in (excluded from) the MSCI Taiwan Index after the announcement date. Moreover, price pressure hypothesis is not supported. Visibility hypothesis, information content hypothesis, downward sloping demand curves hypothesis are supported. Finally, for additions and deletions, the market-adjusted returns are driven by the contemporaneous excess buy of foreign investors and the contemporaneous excess sells of domestic corporations and individuals.

Šiuolaikiniai techologijų pasiekimai pakeitė verslo pasaulį. Tokia kaita įtakoja bendrąją politiką, įpareigodama UAB darbuotojų poreikį mokytis visą gyvenimą ir įteisinti kaip vieną iš pagrindinių prioritetų. Mokymas tampa jau nebe epizodine patirtimi, o nuolatine gyvenimo dalimi. Vadinasi, mokymosi galimybės turi būti prieinamos visiems visais gyvenimo tarpsniais ir bet kurioje aplinkoje. Suaugusiųjų mokymui ypač svarbus kompetencijomis grįstas mokymas, suteikiantis žinių ir gebėjimų, kurias UAB darbuotojai galėtų taikyti praktiškai. O praktiškai taikyti žinias yra svarbu ir aktualu dabartinėje kintančioje visuomenėje. Tuo tarpu mokymasis darbo vietoje yra ypač svarbus. Todėl mokyti UAB darbuotojus ir kelti jų profesinę kvalifikacija, tai pačių įmonių interesai ir poreikiai. Tai sąlygoja susidariusios priežastys, kaip mokslo ir technikos pažanga, reikalaujanti naujų specialistų, nuolatinė darbo pobūdžio kaita. UAB darbuotojų reikiamų kompetencijų neturėjimas sunkina bei mažina galimybes sėkmingai veikti darbo rinkoje. Vadinasi, UAB darbuotojų mokymasis ir kvalifikacijos kėlimas bendrovei naudingas, kadangi didina lankstumą ir skatina motyvacijos augimą. / Modern techniques achievements changed the business world. This change affects the general policy, imposing the JSC employees need for lifelong learning and the validation of one of the main priorities. At the same time, lifelong learning is not only government institutions, educational institutions, and the JSC's concerns and the willingness of workers to remain competitive in the labor market. Training is no longer episodic experience, and a permanent part of life. Thus, learning opportunities must be available to all in all life, and in any environment. Adult education is particularly important skills-based training, knowledge and skills to JSC employees to apply in practice. A practical application of knowledge is important and relevant to the current changing society. While the job training is crucial. Therefore, the training of workers and JSC to raise their professional qualifications, the same corporate interests and needs. JSC staff in addressing the professional qualification of the problem of the use of the private company, as well as external qualification of the potential of the system. Determines the competitiveness of the company's key factors, the tools, staff skills and qualifications, abilities and qualifications of managers. However, there is a major problem, the JSC, employers are not convinced that the training of workers will benefit, taking into account the economic levels of today.

This dissertation has three aims: 1. To evaluate several ethical theories about responsibility towards future generations. 2. To construct a theory about responsibility towards future generations. 3. To carry out an ethical evaluation of different nuclear waste management methods. Five theories are evaluated with the help of evaluative criteria, primarily: A theory must provide future generations with some independent moral status. A theory should acknowledge moral pluralism. A theory should provide some normative claims about real-world problems. Derek Parfit’s theory provides future generations with full moral status. But it is incompatible with moral pluralism, and does not provide reasonable normative claims about real-world problems. Brian Barry’s theory provides such claims and a useful idea about risk management, but it does not provide an argument why future generations ought to exist. Avner de-Shalit’s theory explains why they ought to exist; however, his theory can not easily explain why we ought to care for other people than those in our own community. Emmanuel Agius’ theory gives an ontological explanation for mankind’s unity, but reduces conflicts of interests to a common good. Finally, Hans Jonas’ theory shifts the focus from the situation of future generations to the preconditions of human life generally. However, his theory presupposes a specific ontology, which might be unable to motivate people to act. The concluding chapters describe a narrative theory of responsibility. It claims that we should comprehend ourselves as parts of the common story of mankind and that we ought to provide future generations with equal opportunities. This implies that we should avoid transferring risks and focus on reducing the long-term risks associated with the nuclear waste.

Over the last twenty years, the concepts of sustainability and sustainable development have assumed political importance around the world, and have been largely embraced by governments and prominent international institutions. These concepts have been a means of tackling the challenges of population growth and environmental change. For the UK water sector, these concepts now represent a multitude of challenges. The confluence of climate change and population growth is reducing access to, and the availability of, water resources. The financial costs of inputs such as energy, chemicals, materials and cost of process by-products such as greenhouse gases, carbon, and waste services continue to rise. Government regulators are demanding an improvement in the quality of services, increasingly stringent conditions for emissions to water, air or land, catchment-specific management of the water environment, and the adoption of longterm planning horizons. The UK government has expectations that the water sector will play a role in the delivery of its targets for reducing energy consumption and carbon emissions. Society demands that WaSCs engage in high-level stakeholder consultations and employ long-term visions to guide their decision-making. Finally, WaSCs are increasingly expected to demonstrate and respond to local and global concerns (under the rubric of corporate responsibility) to further justify their value to society. Cont/d.

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Background/problem: Historically, the audit and finance industry have been dominated by men but today the majority of the co-workers are women. Despite this progress, women in both industries are still underrepresented in top positions and are still facing problems in their career advancement. Purpose: The aim of the study is to describe and explain similarities and differences between women’s experienced career opportunities in the audit and finance industry. Method: 12 hypotheses have been derived from previous studies and theories. The hypotheses were tested using telephone surveys with 79 women from the audit industry and 81 women from the finance industry. Conclusion: Women in the accounting profession experience that they have better career opportunities than women in the finance industry. The main factors that influence women in the audit industry are age, family, health, previous working experience and promotion. Where as in the finance industry age, previous working experience and ambition are the primary factors that influence women’s career opportunities. / Bakgrund/problem: Revisions- och finansbranschen har historiskt sett varit mansdominerade branscher men är idag yrken där en övervägande del är kvinnor. Trots utvecklingen är kvinnor inom båda branscherna underrepresenterade på toppositioner och många kvinnor möter hinder för att göra karriär. Syfte: Syftet med studien är att beskriva och förklara likheter och skillnader mellan kvinnors upplevda karriärmöjligheter i revisions- och finansbranschen. Metod: 12 hypoteser har härletts utifrån tidigare studier och forskning. Hypoteserna har testats genom telefonenkäter med hjälp av 79 kvinnor från revisionsbranschen och 81 kvinnor från finansbranschen. Slutsats: Kvinnor i revisionsbranschen upplever att de har något bättre karriärmöjligheter än kvinnor i finansbranschen. De främsta faktorerna som påverkar kvinnors karriärmöjligheter i revisionsbranschen är ålder, familj, hälsa, arbetslivserfarenhet och befordran. I finansbranschen är ålder,arbetslivserfarenhet och ambitionsnivå de primära faktorerna för finanskvinnors karriärmöjligheter.