| 11. |
- Box, Marcus
(författare)
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New Venture, Survival, Growth : Continuance, Termination and Growth of Business Firms and Business Populations in Sweden During the 20th Century
- 2005
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation focuses on the formation, growth and discontinuance of business populations and firms in Sweden during the 20th century. It addresses some key issues in the domain of economic and social sciences, and in particular entrepreneurship and small business research: if and when firms grow, stagnate and decline, as well as how long firms survive and when they are likely to disband. Previous research has primarily analyzed these questions from a short time frame. Further, an individual or firm-oriented focus is commonly assumed. In that, alternative or complementary explanations to the growth and survival of firms may be disregarded. In contrast to much previous research, this dissertation assumes a micro-to-macro, longitudinal and demographic population approach. The period of investigation is over one hundred years. In addressing the growth and survival of firms, it takes into account the impact of firm-specific structural factors (such as firm age and size), generation (cohort) effects, as well as the influence of macroeconomic, exogenous factors. Further, the relationship between managerial/ownership succession and firm performance is also addressed. Both cross-sectional and longitudinal databases are employed in the dissertation. Its main empirical material consists of unique longitudinal data on new business firms, traced at the firm level from their birth to their termination. More specifically, seven birth cohorts – generations – of approximately 2,200 firms founded in 1899, 1909, 1912, 1921, 1930, 1942 and 1950 are included. The main findings show that ownership/management succession in firms had a quite weak correlation with firm performance and survival. At least at an aggregate level, and with some exceptions, it is debatable if the loss and replacement of owner-managers in small and in larger firms have any observable effects on firm performance. Furthermore, macroeconomic phenomena influence the conditions of individual firms as well as populations/aggregates of businesses. Both the growth and termination of firms and firm populations are found to be related to real economic (environmental) conditions; e.g. favorable macroeconomic conditions implied that firms grew in size. At the same time, under certain circumstances, the influence of structural variables (firm age and size) – as suggested in much previous research – is found to be of importance. As concerns firm growth, as well as firm termination, the economic environment and structural factors interact. These findings challenges individual or firm-level research that mainly focus on personal traits and behaviors in explaining firm success and failure. Other previous assumptions are also challenged when taking a longer time perspective into consideration. For decades, organization and business research have acknowledged a liability of newness and of size for business firms. While this might be true under some conditions, this liability of newness is falsified in the study: the termination behavior of some firm generations did not correspond with these assumptions. Thus, the perspectives and methodology applied in the dissertation complement earlier approaches in entrepreneurship and small business research.
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| 12. |
- Rytkönen, Paulina
(författare)
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Fruits of Capitalism, Modernisation of Chilean Agriculture 1950-2000
- 2004
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Bok (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The so-called Chilean economic miracle during the 1980s and 1990s connotes not only high-speed economic growth but also a profound structural transformation of the Chilean economy. Most previous research ascribes growth and transformation to the liberalisation of markets and other neo-liberal policy instruments introduced after 1974. Policies, before as well as after 1974, have indeed been important for creating preconditions for growth and transformation. However, in the present study it is argued that by overemphasising the role of polices one may partly disregard the historical process by which capitalist forms of organisation have gained momentum in the productive system as new technologies worked have their way into the agricultural sector. In this study, the dynamics of the transformation of Chilean agriculture are analysed by using the methodological tools offered by the Dahménian theory of Development Blocks. Empirically the study delves into three different sub-sectors (wine, fruit and milk) with the purpose to portray the transformation of both export agriculture and traditional agriculture. The study focused technical renewal as a key part of the modernisation process. The main conclusion of the study is that the modernisation of Chilean agriculture was caused by the transformation pressure emanating from the market. However, the selective institutions that paved the way for the successful entry of capitalism in Chilean agriculture were ironically mainly created under the land reforms during the structuralist and socialist periods of the 1960s and early 1970s.
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| 13. |
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| 14. |
- Millak, Jurek
(författare)
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Organisatorisk kompetens : organisatorisk kompetens och inlärning vid IT-satsningar i tre sjukvårdsorganisationer
- 1998
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The overall purpose of the study is to analyse and to create an understanding of the phenomenon of organisational competence in conjunction with the introduction of information technology (IT) or other competence raising measures where IT plays an important part. Comparative case studies have been chosen as the method and three different organisations have been investigated. The analysis and conclusions are based on a qualitative method inspired by Strauss and Corbin.The contribution to research from this study is as follows:In addition to technical and social competence the concept of awareness is introduced, which relates both of these concepts to the environment. Without awareness or insight into the competence which is required, or where and when it is required, the organisation is unable to utilise its total competence in a suitable manner. Further dimensions, both visible and invisible, are required in order to make a more penetrating analysis of the phenomenon of organisational competence.Two new concepts, core competence and peripheral competence are introduced. Core competence has a direct bearing on the core activity of the organisation. It is established in the study that organisational competence is developed when the investment relates to this core competence.There are a number of dimensions in an organisation which are extremely important if an investment in organisational competence is to succeed. These include cooperation among different employee groups, management support which legitimises the investment and the attitudes of the individual managers and employees. The size of the organisation is also important; it is primarily the small organisations which are successful. The financial circumstances of the organisation are of course important, but to a lesser extent than expected. Investments in organisational competence, as long as they refer to core competences, take place whether or not external financing is available.The study shows clearly that investment in IT should not be regarded as a goal in itself. In the successful investments, it is apparent that IT is only one of the means available and that it should be regarded as an integral part of a greater whole.For organisational learning to take place and for changes in organisational competence to be attained, it is essential that the organisation regards and classifies IT as part of its core competence.
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| 15. |
- Skyrman, Viktor, et al.
(författare)
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Financialized accumulation, neoliberal hegemony, and the transformation of the Swedish Welfare Model, 1980–2020
- 2022
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Ingår i: Capital and Class. - : SAGE Publications. - 0309-8168 .- 2041-0980.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Drawing on a Gramscian Regulation Approach and Harvey’s accumulation by dispossession thesis, this article discusses the structural and hegemonic mechanisms of the neoliberal transformation of Sweden’s welfare sectors. Providing new longitudinal data on welfare retrenchment, corporate governance, wealth shares, and private economic power, the article further analyzes how the transformation of the Swedish post-war universal welfare model is related to class struggle and accumulation regime change in the Swedish economy. Following a decade-long countermobilization of Swedish capital and a severe economic crisis in the early 1990s, neoliberal economic common sense was cemented among social democratic policy elites that manifested itself in an institutionalized austerity polity, leading to a slow but steady dismantling of the Swedish welfare project. Roughly a fifth of employees in the three largest welfare sectors work in private welfare companies that generate tax-financed profits on politically created welfare markets. Welfare profits are in turn defended by a welfare–industrial complex and undergirded by a hegemonic bloc consisting of capital elites and sympathetic policymakers. In the virtual absence of vocal antihegemonic forces, many social democratic leaders have limited criticism against welfare profits throughout the last decades. On the contrary, austerity measures practiced by Swedish social democrats have thereto led to deteriorating social cohesion and spawned distrust among core social democratic voters.
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| 16. |
- Hagsten, Eva, et al.
(författare)
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Digital transformation as a means to attract innovative establishments to municipalities
- 2024
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Ingår i: Information Technology for Development. - : Routledge. - 0268-1102 .- 1554-0170.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study on regional development investigates if digital transformation is a means to attract innovative establishments to municipalities. By doing so, the relationship between the availability of high-speed broadband close by and the number of innovative establishments (workplaces) across all 290 municipalities in Sweden is explored. Panel data for eleven years (2010-2021) originate from official registers. Results based on Fixed Effects Poisson estimations including spatially weighted variables indicate that the digital transformation in the guise of high-speed broadband access is important for ICT (micro) establishments and those in declining municipalities, although the proportion of highly skilled inhabitants renders stronger estimates. For high technology and R&D establishments, access to high-speed broadband is not a relevant location factor. The estimates are robust to endogeneity as tested by the control function approach.
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| 17. |
- Aaboen, Lise, 1978, et al.
(författare)
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Incubator performance : An efficiency frontier analysis
- 2008
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Ingår i: International Journal of Business Innovation and Research. - 1751-0252 .- 1751-0260. ; 2:4, s. 354-380
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Assessments and evaluations of incubators has been a topic of discussion for as long as incubators have been in existence due to the fact that there has not been an agreement on how to determine good performance. This paper demonstrates the use of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) when studying performance of incubators. More specifically, it does so within the four dimensions of cooperation with universities, business networks, external funding and competence development on a sample of 16 Swedish incubators. We show that DEA enables us to measure non-numerical dimensions, and to simultaneously take into account the efforts made by both the incubator and the outcomes. Moreover, DEA provides benchmarks and, based on a model that divides the incubators into four different groups, illustrates the difference between the benchmark and the incubators' current situation.
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| 18. |
- Wulff, Fredrik, et al.
(författare)
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Reduction of Baltic Sea Nutrient Inputs and Allocation of Abatement Costs Within the Baltic Sea Catchment
- 2014
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Ingår i: Ambio. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 43:1, s. 11-25
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) requires tools to simulate effects and costs of various nutrient abatement strategies. Hierarchically connected databases and models of the entire catchment have been created to allow decision makers to view scenarios via the decision support system NEST. Increased intensity in agriculture in transient countries would result in increased nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea, particularly from Poland, the Baltic States, and Russia. Nutrient retentions are high, which means that the nutrient reduction goals of 135 000 tons N and 15 000 tons P, as formulated in the BSAP from 2007, correspond to a reduction in nutrient loadings to watersheds by 675 000 tons N and 158 000 tons P. A cost-minimization model was used to allocate nutrient reductions to measures and countries where the costs for reducing loads are low. The minimum annual cost to meet BSAP basin targets is estimated to 4.7 billion a,not sign.
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| 19. |
- Fyrberg, Anna, 1980-, et al.
(författare)
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What about interaction? Networks and brands as integrators within service-dominant logic
- 2009
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Ingår i: International Journal of Service Industry Management. - UK : Emerald. - 0956-4233 .- 1758-6704 .- 1757-5818 .- 1757-5826. ; 20:4, s. 420-432
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The paper conceptualizes the key actors involved in the co-creation process as Brand Governor, Providers and Customers. In addition, it proposes an advancement of the service brand-relationship-value triangle introduced by Brodie et al. by linking the key processes and actors in the triangle. It is found that the network approach provides a deeper understanding of how actors integrate with one another and how this interaction leads to co-created outcomes that can be translated into value
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| 20. |
- Yazdanfar, Darush, et al.
(författare)
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Competence development and performance among Swedish micro firms
- 2014
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Ingår i: European Journal of Training and Development. - UK : Emerald Group Publishing Limited. - 2046-9012. ; 38:3, s. 162-179
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Purpose: This study examines the association between performance and competence development among Swedish micro firms, measured as number of hours per person a company allocates annually to competence development. Design/methodology/approach: A panel dataset consisting of around 395 firms will be analyzed using seemingly unrelated regression-model (SUR-model) for relationships between the hours allocated to competence development and various proxies for business performance, and the relationship between attending a business training program and various proxies for business performance. Findings: The empirical results are mixed showing a positive association between owners' attendance on a business training program and company performance merely with regard to four performance variables: better job satisfaction within a company, increased number of employees, organizational improvements and increased exports. However, the findings provide no evidence to suggest that there is a link between competence development and other performance variables. Practical implications: The present study provides a better understanding of the relationship between company performance and competence development. An investment in entrepreneur training and education could ensure the improvement of the performance of micro firms. This implication is especially relevant to firms in such industries as the service sectors, which are highly competitive. Originality/value: This study is based on a unique sample including many relevant variables, compared to previous researches. To the authors' best knowledge, this study is the one of the first empirical investigations focusing on this issue in the Swedish context.
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