Syftet med denna bok är att ge en översiktsbild av forskning om samspelet mellan utbildning, yrkesverksamhet och lärande. Avsikten är också att överbrygga klyftan mellan en i huvudsak utbildningsinriktad forskning och en forskning med tonvikt på lärande, utveckling och förändring. Fokus är kompetensförsörjningen till och inom arbetslivet. Uppmärksamhet ägnas även överutbildning och underlärande, dvs. den klassiska frågan om matchning mellan utbud och efterfrågan. Innehållet belyser även yrkesbegreppet och hur kvalifikationskraven ändras eller är stabila över tid i olika verksamheter samt villkoren för lärande på arbetsplatsen.

Förutom en översikt av aktuell svensk forskning syftar boken till att skapa underlag för policyutveckling och konkreta insatser när det gäller villkoren för kompetensförsörjning och lärande i arbetslivet. Boken riktar sig till utbildningar i högskolan i allmänhet och lärarutbildningar i synnerhet med syfte att skapa ökad insikt om hur kunskap utvecklas och nyttiggörs i utbildning och arbetsliv. En annan målgrupp är politiker, utbildningsplanerare och företrädare för arbetsmarknadspolitik och arbetsmarknadens parter med intresse för hur utbildning, arbetsmarknad och välfärd utvecklas i Sverige.

Managing innovation in smaller firms imposes challenges of specific nature. Such challenges include: scarcity of resources for R&D and innovation activities, complexity of scientific fields, coordinating innovation activities with the operational functions of the firm and availability of access to up-to-date scientific excellence. A question of importance should be raised as to how one can use the recent development in information and communication technologies (ITCs) to meet these challenges and to facilitate innovation activities in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), specially the high- technology smaller firms (HTSFs), as these use innovation as their major competitive edge. In this conceptual paper we proposed using a newly introduced management paradigm, namely “internetisation management” to achieve the said. In the article we discussed the different challenges of innovation in HTSFs and how these challenges can be meet when adapting the internetisation management paradigm. The work shed the light on the need for a coupling between management and innovation studies in relation to SMEs while taking in consideration the e-globalized nature of the modern economy. It addresses in a more particular way HTSFs need for that coupling.

Syftet med denna rapport är att bidra till en ökad förståelse för hur två regionala intermediära organisationer, inom HR-området, arbetar med förändrings- och kompetensrelaterade frågor.

En interaktiv forskningsansats har tillämpats vilket innebär att planering och genomförande av forskningsarbetet har skett i dialog med berörda praktiker. Det empiriska materialet utgörs främst av 12 intervjuer med personer som arbetar inom de studerade intermediära organisationerna.

Resultaten i denna studie visar att det finns många likheter mellan de två studerade intermediära organisationerna. Båda erbjuder ett brett spektra av HR-tjänster, ägs av sina kundföretag och har en samverkande roll mellan kundföretagen. Resultaten visar också att de båda intermediärerna har utvecklat en relativt speciell roll som intermediärer som innebär att de, i vissa avseenden, arbetar både som en extern och en intern HR-resurs till sina kundföretag. Även när det gäller arbetets organisering visar resultaten på flera likheter mellan de studerade intermediära organisationerna. Personalen i båda intermediärorganisationerna arbetar mycket flexibelt och anpassar sitt arbetssätt efter kundernas behov och önskemål. Få standardiserade modeller eller arbetsverktyg används i arbetet och det finns inte något utvecklat system för dokumentation och kunskapsöverföring som används aktivt inom intermediärorganisationerna. Samtidigt tyder resultaten på att ena av de två organisationerna har en något mer fast struktur med tydligt definierade arbetsområden och roller. Det finns också vissa skillnader mellan organisationerna vad gäller hur man önskar att inrikta och organisera sitt arbete i framtiden. Vidare visar resultaten från denna studie att personalen, inom de båda studerade organisationerna, upplever att deras arbete kan bidra till att kundföretagen får nya perspektiv och synsätt. I bästa fall kan även arbetet bidra till att företagen kan arbeta mer strategiskt och att de lär sig hantera olika problematiska situationer på egen hand och får en ökad beredskap att hantera förändring och problem i framtiden. Samtidigt är många uppdrag av mer akut och kortsiktig karaktär vilket innebär att det kan vara svårt att bidra till mer långsiktiga resultat i kundföretagen.

BACKGROUND:

Quality improvement initiatives have expanded recently within the healthcare sector. Studies have shown that less than 40% of these initiatives are successful, indicating the need for an instrument that can measure the progress and results of quality improvement initiatives and answer questions about how quality initiatives are conducted. The aim of the present study was to develop and test an instrument to measure improvement process and outcome in Swedish healthcare.

METHODS:

A questionnaire, founded on the Minnesota Innovation Survey (MIS), was developed in several steps. Items were merged and answer alternatives were revised. Employees participating in a county council improvement program received the web-based questionnaire. Data was analysed by descriptive statistics and correlation analysis. The questionnaire psychometric properties were investigated and an exploratory factor analysis was conducted.

RESULTS:

The Swedish Improvement Measurement Questionnaire consists of 27 items. The Improvement Effectiveness Outcome dimension consists of three items and has a Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.67. The Internal Improvement Processes dimension consists of eight sub-dimensions with a total of 24 items. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the complete dimension was 0.72. Three significant item correlations were found. A large involvement in the improvement initiative was shown and the majority of the respondents were satisfied with their work.

CONCLUSIONS:

The psychometric property tests suggest initial support for the questionnaire to study and evaluate quality improvement initiatives in Swedish healthcare settings. The overall satisfaction with the quality improvement initiative correlates positively to the awareness of individual responsibilities.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether an improvement programme can contribute to positive sustainable improvements in an organisation, and whether financial incentives are driving forces for improvements. The material was all projects (n=232) that applied for funding in a county council improvement programme between 2007 and 2010. The projects were analysed as to whether they received funding (n=98) or were rejected (n=95). In addition, a categorisation of the projects intentions was analysed. Some projects were still ongoing, but 50 projects were implemented and sustained two or more years after being finalised. Implemented improvements were on different levels, from (micro-level) units up to the entire (macro-level) organisation. In addition, 27 rejected projects were finalised without funding. Eighteen of those 27 were sustainably implemented. This study indicates that there are incentives other than financial at work if an improvement programme contributes to sustainable improvements in the organisation. To encourage practice-based improvements is one way of incentivising the intention and effort to become and perform better.

Background: From a management point of view, there are many different approaches from which to choose to engage staff members in initiatives to improve performance.

Objective: The present study evaluated how two different types of improvement strategies facilitate and encourage involvement of different professional groups in health-care organizations.

Methods/Design: Empirical data of two different types of strategies were collected within an improvement project in a County Council in Sweden. The data analysis was carried out through classifying the participants' profession, position, gender, and the organizational administration of which they were a part, in relation to their participation.

Setting: An improvement project in a County Council in Sweden.

Participants: Designed Improvement Processes consisted of n=105 teams and Intrapreneurship Projects of n=202 projects.

Intervention: Two different types of improvement strategies, Designed Improvement Processes and Intrapreneurship Projects.

Main Outcome Measures: How two different types of improvement strategies facilitate and encourage involvement of different professional groups in healthcare organizations.

Results: Nurses were the largest group participating in both improvement initiatives. Physicians were also well represented, although they seemed to prefer the less structured Intrapreneurship Projects approach. Assistant nurses, being the second largest staff group, were poorly represented in both initiatives. This indicates that the benefits and support for one group may push another group aside.

Conclusions: Managers need to give prerequisites and incentives for staff who do not participate in improvements to do so. Comparisons of different types of improvement initiatives are an underused research strategy that yields interesting and thoughtful results.

To measure the effect of quality improvement interventions, it is appropriate to use analysis methods that measure data over time. Examples of such methods include statistical process control analysis and interrupted time series with segmented regression analysis. This article compares the use of statistical process control analysis and interrupted time series with segmented regression analysis for evaluating the longitudinal effects of quality improvement interventions, using an example study on an evaluation of a computerized decision support system.

Most social ventures cross the boundaries between the private, the public and the non-profit/voluntary sectors, and this broad involvement of actors and intertwining of sectors makes the label 'societal' entrepreneurship more appropriate. Stating the importance of both the local and the broader societal context, the book reports close-up studies from a variety of social ventures. Generic themes include positioning societal entrepreneurship against other images of collective entrepreneurship, critically penetrating its assumptions and practices and proposing ways of promoting societal entrepreneurship more widely.

Traditionellt utvecklingsarbete - särskilt det som drivs i projektform - ifrågasätts alltmer. Resultaten blir sällan bestående, än mindre innovativa eller genomgripande. För att driva mer komplexa och långsiktiga processer prövas nya former - nätverk, innovationssystem, kluster, Triple Helix, partnerskap. -För att förändra ett system, krävs ett system för utveckling-, är tanken. Denna bok handlar om ett sådant -systeminitiativ- för utveckling, nämligen utvecklingspartnerskap inom ett EUprogrammet Equal. Tanken är att olika parter, i stället ska blir partners som gemensamt ska driva och ta ansvar för en utveckling. Är det realistiskt? Vad krävs i så fall för att samordna och leda ett sådant system? Boken visar på möjligheter och svårigheter med partnerskap. Den ska vara ett stöd för dig som vill arbeta med utveckling i nya former. Frågorna bygger på erfarna och reflekterande praktikers erfarenheter. De har fått stöd i att synliggöra sina kunskaper av forskare som ifrågasatt och utmanat vedertagna uppfattningar och enkla lösningar.

This book is about how you can work with development or, more precisely, how you can use partnerships to organise development. The book is based on the experience gained in development partnerships in one of the programmes of the European Social Fund, the Equal Programme, but we believe that this experience is generally applicable to other partnerships as well as to other forms of co-operation on development. We can highlight the possibilities and problems relating to working in partnerships and hope that the book can provide support for others, not by providing ready-made answers but rather by asking questions that will encourage reflection.

One of the reasons for producing this book was that we too wanted to learn more about partnerships – especially development partnerships. We wanted to understand their different phases – before, during and after the development work that a development partnership decides to take on. We wanted to know how partnerships can be organised and led, what impact the composition and selection of members has, how feedback to the organisations of each individual partner works, whether the work leads to any results, and if so whether the results are utilised and disseminated. We also wanted to learn more about transnational work in partnerships.

As our work is based on the experience gained in the Equal Programme, in which partnership is a prerequisite for the allocation of funds, our purpose is not to question partnership as an organisational form. Instead, we wish to describe and analyse the experience gained in a way that will help you as a reader to reflect on and make your own well-considered decisions about your partnership. The examples that are presented here are therefore intended as starting points for reflection and dialogue, not as models or templates. The questions that are asked are concretised in some cases by the examples that are presented, but they are also based on the previous and general experience of the participants and the authors.

This anthology uses a gender perspective to analyse constraining structures in innovation systems. Focusing on mainstream policies as well as regional and organizational practices, it presents procedures, methods and methodologies to develop genderaware, innovative organisations.

Fostering innovation requires ability to question what is taken for granted and perceived as the natural order. Challenging this order often requires a critical mind where a gender perspective can be useful. The experience of integrating a gender perspective can be likened to turning a kaleidoscope; the resulting shift in perspective causes new images and highlights new opportunities.

This anthology is the result of more than ten years’ research and development work funded by VINNOVA and aimed at establishing a research field in gender and innovation. Ten years ago, there were few researchers and limited research focusing on this area. Today, the picture is different and this anthology presents the analyses of 31 researchers on how gender is a constraining structure within innovation systems. There is little doubt that integrating a gender perspective helps promoting innovation.

I Hållbart arbetsliv analyserar och diskuterar författarna konflikten mellan det korta projektet och de önskade långsiktiga effekterna. Bakgrunden är ett stort nationellt hälsoprojekt inom offentlig sektor. Boken visar att det finns många faktorer: delaktighet, förankring, ägarskap, lärande och reflektion, styrning, spridning - som behöver diskuteras inför och under ett utvecklingsarbete. I synnerhet om projektet har som mål att leda till långsiktiga förändringar.

This qualitative, empirical study explores and describes the variation in how evidence-based practice (EBP) is understood in social work. A phenomenographic approach to design and analysis was applied. Fourteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with politicians, managers and executive staff in three social welfare offices in Sweden. The main findings suggest that there are qualitatively different ways in which EBP is understood, described in five categories: (i) fragmented; (ii) discursive; (iii) instrumental; (iv) multifaceted; and (v) critical. The outcome space is hierarchically structured with a logical relationship between the categories. However, the informants found it difficult to account for EBP, depending on what was expressed as deficient knowledge of EBP in the organisation, as well as ability to provide a seemly context for EBP. The results highlight the importance of acknowledging these differences in the organisation to compose a supportive atmosphere for EBP to thrive rather than merely assume the case of evidence-based social work. The categories can be utilised as stimuli for reflection in social work practice, and thereby provide the possibility to promote knowledge use and learning in the evolving evidence-based social work.

The aim of this mainly descriptive study is to sketch out how recently graduated physicians experience the transition from higher education to working life. As a part of a more extensive research project 12 physicians, who had been working for a few months, were interviewed. The physicians were asked to talk about what they perceived as central aspects of their university-education and what they had learned, their experience of the transition and the first encounter with working life. During the qualitative analysis a complex picture of the process has emerged and it is difficult to distinguish any homogeneity in the physicians’ experiences.

In this chapter I will discuss some of the important issues relating to interactive and action research. This chapter will have focus on possibilities and limitations of interactive research as it is presented in some of the literature and carried out in a strong research environment. I will also use my own research to illustrate the issues raised.

The focus of my presentation is on how interactive research (Aagard Nielsen & Svensson 2006) has dealt with some of the challenging dilemmas that are well-known also in action research. These dilemmas can be summarised in the following way:

1. How to be part of a change process and at the same time keep a critical distance to it.
2. How to organise a joint learning process with participants that leads to new theories and concepts.
3. How to acquire status and position in the research community.

The presentation is based on how interactive research has been described within the Nordic countries in publications produced by some 60 researchers from 10 disciplines (Svensson et al 2002; Aagaard Nielsen & Svensson 2006; Svensson et al 2007; Johannisson et al 2008; Westlander 2008). At the end of each section I comment on the dilemmas by referring to my own experiences as a researcher.

Styrningen av en verksamhet kan vara avgörande för om och hur en framtida satsning på kompetensutveckling inom äldreomsorgen kommer att se ut. Parallellt med och som en kritik mot den offentliga och uppifråndrivna strategin för kvalitetsutveckling har nya styrprinciper vuxit fram i äldreomsorgen, nämligen brukarstyrning och eget val. Dessa nya styrprinciper kan leda till att kompetensinsatser inte prioriteras. I stället kan det mer handla om att välja rätt personal som är anpasslig och som har de kunskaper som krävs i ett kortsiktigt perspektiv. Artikeln, som är tentativ, vill alltså diskutera betydelsen av olika styrprinciper inom omsorgen och vad de kan betyda för personalens kompetens i framtiden. Underlaget bygger på en litteraturgenomgång av forskning i de nordiska länderna och en sammanfattning av erfarenheterna från ett omfattande nationellt program, där avsikten var att kompetensutveckling ska leda till en ökad kvalitet.

How can play be used to unravel the discourse of the gendered hero entrepreneur and instead describe mundane entrepreneuring? Further, how can the doing of gendered social orders be problematized when entrepreneuring is equated with play? In this article we answer these questions by engaging with the French social theorist Caillois (1961) conceptualization of play as being at the heart of all higher culture. Two ethnographic cases act as our vehicle in analysing play as entrepreneuring. From a rich description of these cases we find that it is not a question of playing or not playing, but about how to play. All four forms of play described by Caillois are present, which illustrates the variation of entrepreneuring and the richness of activities conducted in the doing of entrepreneurship. Further, both ways of playing discussed by Caillois are found. Whilst these two ways are interrelated on a continuum in the theory of play, they have been separated in entrepreneurship discourse, where they underpin the tendency to differentiate between the hero entrepreneur and ordinary people. Finally, we engage in a more interpretive and reflective discussion on entrepreneuring as performative acts through which social orders can be not only reproduced but also transformed.

The purpose of this article is to describe how Quality Management (QM) is perceived today by scholars at three Swedish universities, and into what QM is expected to develop into in twenty years. Data were collected through structured workshops using affinity diagrams with scholars teaching and performing research in the QM field. The results show that QM currently is perceived as consisting of a set of core of principles, methods and tools. The future outlook includes three possible development directions for QM are seen: [1] searching for a “discipline X” where QM can contribute while keeping its toolbox, [2] focus on a core based on the traditional quality technology toolbox with methods and tools, and [3] a risk that QM, as it is today, may seize to exist and be diffused into other disciplines.

The CDIO Syllabus includes a section dealing with Enterprise, Societal and Environmental Context (Section 4) that was extended in 2011, which implies its growing importance. The goals and content of this section differ from those of the core engineering sections and include awareness of the impact of engineering on society and environment as well as management of people and resources. It may be challenging to teach and learn these topics within the timeframe of already dense educational programs. In this paper we present both the ways of incorporating this section into curricula and a survey of student learning experiences using engineering programs at Linköping University, Sweden, as the empirical setting. Our study covers five engineering programs: Applied Physics & Electrical Engineering; Computer Science and Engineering; Engineering Biology; Industrial Engineering & Management; and Mechanical Engineering. The results show that some of the programs incorporate Section 4 topics mainly through project courses where student teams work on specified assignments within their programs’ focus area (such as software) while training their project management skills and gaining insights into business and societal context. Other programs, especially Industrial Engineering & Management, include several courses where Section 4 topics are learned through lectures, seminars, experiential learning and less extensive group assignments. The results from our survey of students’ learning experiences show that students vary in their evaluation with regard to section 4 topics, with for example Mechanical Engineering students valuing their program higher than others when it comes to their learning about responsibilities of engineers to the society. Industrial Engineering & Management students on the other hand value their program higher than others concerning learning of topics such as business context. We also show that extra-curricular activities in the form of active engagement in students clubs at the university are beneficial for developing leadership abilities during engineering education.

Network-building activities of PhD students are an important area of study in furthering our understanding of academic entrepreneurship. This paper focuses on PhD students’ participation in network-building activities defined as mobility and collaboration, as well as own interest in and perceived grade of support for commercialisation from various levels of the university hierarchy. The results of a large-scale survey (of 1,126 PhD students at Linköping University, Sweden, 41% response rate) presented here show that the majority of PhD students are engaged in collaborations with external organisations, though quite few (one quarter) have spent a part of their PhD education outside their home university. PhD students from all faculties are on average interested in commercialisation and in favour of it. However, PhD students from the faculty of Health Sciences state that it is difficult for them to combine research and commercialisation. Furthermore, interest in commercialisation of research results is relatively lowest amongst those PhD students who are undertaking mobility placements at other universities, thus pointing to an experienced incompatibility of research and academic entrepreneurship.

 The universities are expected to contribute to the society in manifold ways; their main tasks include supplying the labour market with educated workers, developing scientific knowledge, both basic and applied, and recently also supporting entrepreneurial initiatives and commercialisation of research results. PhD education constitutes a considerable part of many universities’ activities and PhD students perform a large share of research. Yet there are few studies concerned with PhD students’ possibilities to commercialise research results or the university context supportiveness in this regard. Therefore, this paper investigates PhD students’ views on commercialisation and perceived grade of support from various levels of the university hierarchy. Moreover, the extent of mobility and external collaborations during PhD education and their correlations with opinions of PhD students are studied. These aspects are studied through analysis of data from a survey of 465 PhD students at Linköping University, Sweden.

The results show that PhD students are on average slightly positive towards commercialisation of research results, although there are differences between various faculties. The university context is perceived as slightly supportive, except for the department and division levels at the faculties of Arts & Sciences (incl. Educational Sciences) and Health Sciences. A majority of PhD students are involved in external collaborations as a part of their PhD education, while a quarter have been spending a part of their PhD studies at another organisation. PhD students’ views on commercialisation are more connected to the direction of mobility than to mobility per se, while for external collaboration interest in commercialisation is lowest amongst those not involved in collaboration at all.

In the university context we see an intensified co-operation with industry which includesmobility aspects e.g. PhDs increasingly working in the private sector. This is a desirabledevelopment since it encourages network formation, knowledge transfer and innovation. Dueto that we have devoted our interest to the formation of PhD students’ professional networksthrough mobility as part of doctoral education. The following questions are addressed in thispaper: 1) How could a mobility program for PhD students be designed and implemented? 2)How are mobility aspects of PhD studies affected by career plans and existing networks in thestudents’ research teams? The data used in this study comes from a novel Swedish approachto PhD education in life science technologies - a program called AgoraLink (ALP). The resultsshow that ALP is in many cases used to develop existing links with industry in the participants’home country and research organisations abroad. Furthermore, the PhD students admitted toextramural activities tend to have well articulated career plans and use the program to realizetheir ambitions. Finally, ALP seems to catalyse mobility and development of previouslyestablished contacts by providing a framework and legitimacy.

As societies strive to address current environmental challenges new markets and opportunities are opening up for both businesses and entrepreneurs implement sustainability within their operations. In a recent report by OECD (2013) it is noted that green entrepreneurs in general have to overcome higher barriers than other entrepreneurs, e.g. concerning regulations, immature markets and shortages of skills. Thus, one key question is how identification, evaluation and exploitation of business opportunities related to sustainable innovation and green business can be effectively supported by organizations such as business incubators. The aim of this study is to investigate business incubators in three European countries with the highest positions on European Union’s Eco-Innovation Scoreboard from 2014 (Finland, Germany, Sweden) with respect to how they manage sustainability aspects. More specifically, we are studying how sustainability in social and environmental terms is integrated into incubators’ processes for selection and support of their tenants. The data was collected through a survey where we reached the management of 360 business incubators in the three countries and received 96 responses. We show that there is substantial interest among incubators to gain an image of being sustainability-profiled. However, this image does not seem to be supported with practical organizational routines when selecting and supporting tenants. While the majority of incubators in Finland, Germany and Sweden consider sustainability an important issue for incubation, few incubators actually offer sustainability specific services or advice (e.g. related to ecodesign or marketing of green products). This is a clear gap in the existing entrepreneurship support system that should be addressed by policymakers, stakeholders and managers of incubators.

Innovation processes in emerging fields of technology frequently utilize scientific knowledge and technical skills from several research areas. Likewise, technological development frequently involves a diverse set of organizations including for example private firms, universities, corporate research labs and public or semi-public research and technology organizations (RTOs). These processes spur the need for both organizational and institutional change and adjustment, e.g. in order to facilitate research and development (R&D) and formation of innovation networks. The main question analyzed in the paper is how RTOs cope with integrating new skills in their competence base in the quest for exploring new emerging science fields and technology applications. The empirical setting consists of Swedish semi-public industrial research institutes active in the fields of pulp & paper technology and electronics, optics & communication technology respectively. The results of the study bring attention to three ways of integrating diverse skills and types of actors in R&D networks. These are: organization of collaborative research in formalized industry-specific R&D programs, purposeful organizational change also including redefinition of categories of core research competence and finally by targeting ‘open’ innovation processes characterized by incorporation of both end-users and skills of neighboring technology areas.

Innovation processes involve diverse sets of organizations including universities, private firms, corporate research labs and public research institutes. Collaborative forms of knowledge production and innovative activity enable actors to reduce risk, specialize, and take advantage of knowledge internal and external to the own organization.

This paper discusses interactions and collaborations between public and private sector innovation. This is done through an analysis of semi-public research institutes in Sweden and their roles as arenas for R&D processes involving industry, university and government in terms of funding, research and public-private innovation. Particular attention is paid to technological niches of research institutes and utilization of research findings from collaborative R&D.

The results show that institutes occupy specific niches which influence their ways of transferring knowledge. It is argued that diversity among R&D performers as well as funding opportunities is paramount for innovation systems to thrive.

Peer feedback is increasingly being used as an important part of higher education, as it has a potential to contribute to development of professional skills such as giving and receiving feedback while having the benefit of not overstretching the teacher resources. In this paper we share our experiences of working with peer feedback in a course on organisation and leadership with approximately 170 students given during the first year of a CDIO-based engineering program. We present and discuss the course design and how peer feedback was organized as well as the experiences of both teachers and students of this course. We observe that working with peer feedback has helped our students in achieving several important outcomes, for example increased learning within the subject, documented development of own writing and assessment skills, and increased awareness of different perspectives on the same topic. However, we also identify problematic aspects of working with peer feedback, such as a large variation in the quality of provided feedback, perceived difficulties when students are asked to provide non-anonymous feedback to their peers, and students’ doubts whether peers can provide as “correct” feedback as the teacher would have been able to give. We discuss the benefits and downsides of peer feedback within the framework of CDIO-based engineering education and conclude by recommending that feedback-related skills should be trained and developed throughout educational programs in a gradual and integrated way.

This article explores the role of labour mobility as a potential cluster advantage. We review the theoretical arguments as for how and why labour mobility could enhance the dynamism and performance of clusters of similar and related firms. A combination of quantitative and qualitative data from two information and communication technology (ICT) clusters is used to answer two research questions: (1) What is the role of mobility enhancing (or restricting) institutions in clusters? and (2) In what ways does labour mobility contribute to knowledge transfer within clusters? The two ICT clusters studied in the article generally seem to have higher levels of mobility, compared to the labour market at large. Although it is regarded as beneficial in theory, most cluster firms try to restrict mobility of workers since they fear the risk and costs of losing staff. Labour mobility is also rarely viewed as a viable way to increase the knowledge bases or contact networks of firms. However, when firms need to recruit the clustered labour markets seem to benefit them by facilitating the use of informal recruitment processes. By way of conclusion it is suggested that cluster firms might be under-investing in mobility and that innovative institutional solutions could help realize clusters mobility potential.

The CDIO-Framework is developed in order to enable engineering students to engineer (Crawley et al 2014) and is relatively straightforward when applied on courses and projects that have a high degree of practical, hands-on engineering elements, such as e.g. developing software or a physical product/prototype. However, in many engineering programs a large part of the courses concern managerial aspects such as project management, leadership, marketing, innovation and entrepreneurship, especially in later years of a program. We are well aware of the fact that the CDIO-framework is developed to work on program-level, however, applied on management courses, commonly only the Conceive and Design can be obtained. Furthermore, these courses are not always structured in such a way that they immediately builds on each other. This dilemma has caused us to adapt CDIO to circumstances of the courses that we give and to reflect upon how more of the CDIO spirit can be transferred to our own modules and activities on course level. The aim of this paper is therefore to develop ways for application on a micro-level where the CDIO spirit can be implemented in management courses at engineering programs. In the paper we give three different practical cases where the CDIO-framework have been applied. The cases show that CDIO works both on micro-level, e.g. in two hour exercises and within the frame of individual courses. For management courses, and especially courses in entrepreneurship and marketing, the framework need to apply a more extrovert focus, i.e. on verification of customer needs and benefits, rather than on technological solutions. 

Past important regional advantages have mainly consisted of geographically bound natural resources such as rivers, iron ores or oil fields. While these remain important, we can likewise observe an advancement of regional advantages which can be constructed and developed through strategies and policies, on both regional and national level. Such regional advantages include entrepreneurial & business climate, knowledge infrastructure, cultural & recreational amenities and education institutions (Asheim et al 2007; Whisler et al 2008).

Universities are especially important organisational actors for regional growth (Etzkowitz & Klofsten, 2005; Audretsch et al., 2005; Sharma et al., 2006). They support local economic development through mechanisms such as: local business communities benefit from knowledge and technology transfer; new human, knowledge, and financial resources are attracted from elsewhere; new public spaces for local conversations are provided; additional amenities, e.g. local services, are created which seems to increase the attractiveness of the region (Lester, 2005; Shapiro, 2006; Mellander & Florida, 2011). University regions attract and retain students and this is a major factor for population growth (Goldstein & Drucker, 2006; Winters, 2011a, 2011b; Haapanen & Tervo, 2011). However, the objection that research universities are not the panacea for regional development is a point of considerable debate (Doloreaux & Parto, 2004; Brulin et al., 2009).

The purpose of this paper is to study how constructed regional advantages in the form of tertiary education institutions contribute to regional development in Sweden. In particular, we focus on development indicators such as population growth, entrepreneurship, knowledge transfer, and regional income.

We use data from Swedish Agency for Higher Education and Statistics Sweden covering population in all Swedish municipalities as well as all tertiary education institutions. We use quantitative methods in order to study growth patterns in the municipalities, comparing population growth of university/university college cities with other places. Furthermore, we use qualitative methods and case studies when further investigating the processes underlying these patterns.

The findings show that that the presence of tertiary education institutions has been a major contributor to the increase in population in Swedish municipalities between 1970 to present. This implies that regional development strategies and policies aiming at building and strengthening university colleges and universities are important and viable tools for stimulating regional growth.

Absorptive capacity and integration skills of firms are crucialfactors when it comes to reaping the benefits from universityindustryrelations. Education and training of individuals withboth academic and industrial experience that can act asbrokers of knowledge is therefore of great importance. Duringrecent years industrial graduate schools have been developedas an answer to this challenge. We investigate them throughan interview study with PhD students and supervisors. We alsoassess long-term impact through interviews with graduatedindividuals focusing on their use of integration skills withintheir work. We conclude that although industrial graduateschools require a multitude of favourable conditions in orderto realise their potential they are also a powerful tool fordeveloping absorptive capacities of PhD students andsupervisors. We show that positive effects of industrialgraduate schools extend in time, through increased capacitiesto e.g. participate in collaborative R&D projects or educatenew students.

Den här studien skulle kunna handla om tre högst existerande dimensioner av de flesta människors arbetsliv. I den första dimensionen känner sjuka människor sig slängda på sophögen när omplacerings- och rehabiliteringsprocesserna gjort sitt. I den andra dimensionen kämpar enskilda människor med att framställa sig så flexibla och anställningsbara som möjligt. I den tredje dimensionen får medarbetarna ett aktivt stöd av arbetsgivaren för att minska risken för insjuknande. Det är en förhoppning att denna rapport ska bidra till att tydliggöra de risker som finns i den första och andra dimensionen. Rapporten ska också öppna portalen till den tredje dimensionen där arbetsgivare och arbetstagare delar på ansvaret för ett gott nutida och framtida arbetsliv.

De flesta av oss har arbetet som en viktig beståndsdel i livet. Livet vid sidan av arbetet är också det givetvis betydelsefullt. Nu, en bit in på 2000-talet, lever många i ett gränsland där arbetet inte tar slut bara för att klockan är fem. På liknande sätt lämnas inte det privata livet helt utanför på arbetsplatserna.

Det moderna livet i dag kan beskrivas som flytande organiserat, där gränserna sällan är skarpa utan snarare flyktiga och suddigt markerade. Många forskare menar att denna flytande organisering är ett resultat av breda samhälleliga processer som globaliserig, individualisering och nationalstatens allt mindre förmåga att styra våra liv utan de storfinansiella aktörernas konkreta inblandning.

I detta individualiserade arbetsliv ställs alltfler och tyngre krav på att även företagoch organisationer behöver bli mer omställningsbara och flexibla. De offentliga organisationerna riskerar t.ex. att förlora uppdrag och skatteintäkter på ett annat och mer abrupt sätt nu än för kanske 20 år sedan. De privata företagen står även de inför stora utmaningar, speciellt på marknader där alltfler aktörer konkurrerar om både uppdrag och kompetent personal.

Även om det inte riktigt går att peka ut någon tydlig organisatör av arbetslivet i dag så tränger sig kraven på omställning, flexibilitet och rörlighet in i minsta vrå i kämpande företag och organisationer. Ord som omställningsprocesser, mobilitet, flexibilitet, employer branding och lean-production är nu här på allvar, åtminstone ett tag, innan andra rörelser och trender tar vid.

Europe 2020 strategy EU puts forward three mutually reinforcing priorities smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. A main driving force are innovation programmes. Our understanding of programme-drivingwill always be tentative but can be improved. Analysis of programmedriving provides an alternative way of tackling the problem. It is an approach that enhances the understanding – contextually, practically and theoretically. Rather than heading for final, concrete and onedimensionaloften quantitative knowledge we should get used to the fact that our understanding always will be fragmentary and imperfect though, on a higher level! Knowledge on innovation programme-driving should improve innovation institutions/practices/ethos in different respects.

Den svenska modellen lever - trots stora omvälvningar, kriser och strukturomvandlingar. Här skildras hur arbetsorganisation, effektivitet i svensk industri och olika innovationssystem har utvecklats inom ramen för en övergripande svensk modell under efterkrigstidens alltmer globaliserade värld. Genom att belysa historiens roll lyfts centrala framtidsfrågor fram, som vilken roll bland annat management och kringliggande institutionella faktorer kan spela för innovationspotentialen i svenskt näringsliv framöver. Den svenska modellen  i en vidare tolkning  har uppvisat en stor överlevnadsförmåga, men frågan om innovationer förblir central för dess framtid.