Defining a framework model to determine total costs of managed desktops using ITIL best practices

In modern day organizations there are an increasing number of IT devices such as computers, mobile phones and printers. These devices can be located and maintained by using specialized IT management applications. Costs related to a single device accumulate from various sources and are normally categorized as direct costs like hardware costs and indirect costs such as labor costs. These costs can be saved in a configuration management database and presented to users using web based development tools such as ASP.NET. The overall costs of IT devices during their lifecycle can be ten times higher than the actual purchase price of the product and ability to define and reduce these costs can save organizations noticeable amount of money. This Master’s Thesis introduces the research field of IT management and defines a custom framework model based on Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) best practices which is designed to be implemented as part of an existing IT management application for defining and presenting IT costs.

Fair value versus historic cost-valuation for biological assets: Implications for the quality of financial information

[spa] Este trabajo realiza un estudio empírico sobre los efectos, que se señalan en las discusiones teóricas, de la utilización del valor razonable (VR) frente al coste histórico (CH), utilizando dos muestras de explotaciones agrícolas, una de las cuales valora sus activos biológicos a CH y la otra a VR. No se encontraron diferencias significativas en los beneficios e ingresos entre ambas muestras, ni siquiera en sus volatilidades. Tampoco se encontraron diferencias significativas en rentabilidad, manipulación contable, ni en el poder de ambos criterios de valoración para predecir los flujos de tesorería. Por el contrario, la mayor parte de los tests realizados revelan un mayor poder de los beneficios calculados bajo el VR para la predicción de los beneficios futuros, respecto de cuando son calculados bajo el CH. El estudio proporciona también evidencia empírica de prácticas contables defectuosas de CH en el sector agrícola, concluyendo que el VR puede representar un criterio de valoración interesante para un sector, como el agrícola, caracterizado por el predominio de pequeñas explotaciones familiares.

Fair value versus historic cost-valuation for biological assets: Implications for the quality of financial information

[spa] Este trabajo realiza un estudio empírico sobre los efectos, que se señalan en las discusiones teóricas, de la utilización del valor razonable (VR) frente al coste histórico (CH), utilizando dos muestras de explotaciones agrícolas, una de las cuales valora sus activos biológicos a CH y la otra a VR. No se encontraron diferencias significativas en los beneficios e ingresos entre ambas muestras, ni siquiera en sus volatilidades. Tampoco se encontraron diferencias significativas en rentabilidad, manipulación contable, ni en el poder de ambos criterios de valoración para predecir los flujos de tesorería. Por el contrario, la mayor parte de los tests realizados revelan un mayor poder de los beneficios calculados bajo el VR para la predicción de los beneficios futuros, respecto de cuando son calculados bajo el CH. El estudio proporciona también evidencia empírica de prácticas contables defectuosas de CH en el sector agrícola, concluyendo que el VR puede representar un criterio de valoración interesante para un sector, como el agrícola, caracterizado por el predominio de pequeñas explotaciones familiares.

Fair value versus historical cost-based valuation for biological assets: Predictability of financial information

There is an intense debate on the convenience of moving from historical cost (HC) toward the fair value (FV) principle. The debate and academic research is usually concerned with financial instruments, but the IAS 41 requirement of fair valuation for biological assets brings it into the agricultural domain. This paper performs an empirical study with a sample of Spanish farms valuing biological assets at HC and a sample applying FV, finding no significant differences between both valuation methods to assess future cash flows. However, most tests reveal more predictive power of future earnings under fair valuation of biological assets, which is not explained by differences in volatility of earnings and profitability. The study also evidences the existence of flawed HC accounting practices for biological assets in agriculture, which suggests scarce information content of this valuation method in the predominant small business units existing in the agricultural sector in advanced Western countries

Acceptance and Use of Information Technology among Nurses in Psychiatric Hospitals

Hoitajien informaatioteknologian hyväksyntä ja käyttö psykiatrisissa sairaaloissa Informaatioteknologian (IT) käyttö ei ole ollut kovin merkittävässä roolissa psykiatrisessa hoitotyössä, vaikka IT sovellusten on todettu vaikuttaneen radikaalisti terveydenhuollon palveluihin ja hoitohenkilökunnan työprosesseihin viime vuosina. Tämän tutkimuksen tavoitteena on kuvata psykiatrisessa hoitotyössä toimivan hoitohenkilökunnan informaatioteknologian hyväksyntää ja käyttöä ja luoda suositus, jonka avulla on mahdollista tukea näitä asioita psykiatrisissa sairaaloissa. Tutkimus koostuu viidestä osatutkimuksesta, joissa on hyödynnetty sekä tilastollisia että laadullisia tutkimusmetodeja. Tutkimusaineistot on kerätty yhdeksän akuuttipsykiatrian osaston hoitohenkilökunnan keskuudessa vuosien 2003-2006 aikana. Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) –teoriaa on hyödynnetty jäsentämään tutkimusprosessia sekä syventämään ymmärrystä saaduista tutkimustuloksista. Tutkimus osoitti kahdeksan keskeistä tekijää, jotka saattavat tukea psykiatrisessa sairaalassa toimivien hoitajien tietoteknologiasovellusten hyväksyntää ja hyödyntämistä, kun nämä tekijät otetaan huomioon uusia sovelluksia käyttöönotettaessa. Tekijät jakautuivat kahteen ryhmään; ulkoiset tekijät (resurssien suuntaaminen, yhteistyö, tietokonetaidot, IT koulutus, sovelluksen käyttöön liittyvä harjoittelu, potilas-hoitaja suhde), sekä käytön helppous ja sovelluksen käytettävyys (käytön ohjeistus, käytettävyyden varmistaminen). TAM teoria todettiin käyttökelpoiseksi tulosten tulkinnassa. Kehitetty suositus sisältää ne toimenpiteet, joiden avulla on mahdollista tukea sekä organisaation johdon että hoitohenkilökunnan sitoutumista ja tätä kautta varmistaa uuden sovelluksen hyväksyntä ja käyttö hoitotyössä. Suositusta on mahdollista hyödyntää käytännössä kun uusia tietojärjestelmiä implementoidaan käyttöön psykiatrisissa sairaaloissa.

Applying collective intelligence to idea evaluation at the front end of innovation

The study focuses on the front end of innovation process. Due to changes in innovation policies and paradigms customers, users and shopfloor employees are becoming increasingly important sources of knowledge. New methods are needed for processing information and ideas coming from multiple sources more effectively. The aim of this study is to develop an idea evaluation tool suitable for the front end of innovation process and capable of utilizing collective intelligence. The study is carried out as a case study research using constructive research approach. The chosen approach suits well for the purposes of the study. The constructive approach focuses on designing new constructs and testing them in real life applications. In this study a tool for evaluating ideas emerging from the course of everyday work is developed and tested in a case organization. Development of the tool is based on current scientific literature on knowledge creation, innovation management and collective intelligence and it is tested in LUT Lahti School of Innovation. Results are encouraging. The idea evaluation tool manages to improve performance at the front end of innovation process and it is accepted in use in the case organization. This study provides insights on what kind of a tool is required for facilitating collective intelligence at the front end of innovation process.

Improving demand forecasting practices in the industrial context

Demand forecasting is one of the fundamental managerial tasks. Most companies do not know their future demands, so they have to make plans based on demand forecasts. The literature offers many methods and approaches for producing forecasts. When selecting the forecasting approach, companies need to estimate the benefits provided by particular methods, as well as the resources that applying the methods call for. Former literature points out that even though many forecasting methods are available, selecting a suitable approach and implementing and managing it is a complex cross-functional matter. However, research that focuses on the managerial side of forecasting is relatively rare. This thesis explores the managerial problems that are involved when demand forecasting methods are applied in a context where a company produces products for other manufacturing companies. Industrial companies have some characteristics that differ from consumer companies, e.g. typically a lower number of customers and closer relationships with customers than in consumer companies. The research questions of this thesis are: 1. What kind of challenges are there in organizing an adequate forecasting process in the industrial context? 2. What kind of tools of analysis can be utilized to support the improvement of the forecasting process? The main methodological approach in this study is design science, where the main objective is to develop tentative solutions to real-life problems. The research data has been collected from two organizations. Managerial problems in organizing demand forecasting can be found in four interlinked areas: 1. defining the operational environment for forecasting, 2. defining the forecasting methods, 3. defining the organizational responsibilities, and 4. defining the forecasting performance measurement process. In all these areas, examples of managerial problems are described, and approaches for mitigating these problems are outlined.

A practice perspective on organizational implementation of information technology

Implementering av ett informationssystem ur en organisatorisk synvinkel initieras av en idé om ett system och avslutas då användningen av det inte längre kräver en medveten ansträngning. Ifall tolkningen av implementering är denna, är det fråga om en långsam och komplicerad process, som berör organisationens alla parter. Ny informationsteknologi anses påverka flertalet arbetsprocesser och organiseringen av det dagliga arbetet. Möjligheterna att ta i bruk systemet och utnyttja det är många. I avhandlingen undersöks implementering av ett system för att administrera hemvårdsbesök där hemvårdare använde handdatorer för att registrera information om besökens längd och innehåll. I avhandlingen observeras vilka förändringar som sker i arbetets praxis p.g.a. det nya systemet och hur dessa förändringar påverkar vårdarbetet. Forskningen inleds med att strukturera teorier om arbetspraxis för kommande analys. Arbetspraxis är inarbetade och rutinmässiga arbetssätt i arbetets sociomateriella omgivning. Arbetspraxis i avhandlingen innebär hemvårdarens praxis och upplevd erfarenhet, där verksamheten informeras av gemensamma arbetssätt, projekt, identiteter och intressen. Organisationens auktoritet kommer även fram i den förverkligade arbetspraxisen. Forskningen genomfördes som en etnografisk longitudinell studie under åren 2001-2004. I studien observerades hur nyttjandet av handdatorerna framskred ur ett organisatoriskt perspektiv. Hemvårdares arbete och verksamhet (arbetspraxis) observerades både under vårdsbesök och under pauser. Därtill intervjuades hemvårdarna för att erhålla en bättre förståelse för de rationaliteter som styr arbetet och hur systemet togs i bruk. Dokument relaterade till projektet att införa ett nytt system och administrativa dokument har utnyttjats som källmaterial. Analysen av källmaterialet styrdes av det teoretiska tillvägagångssättet att undersöka arbetspraxis. Problem som identifierades i samband med införandet av systemet och de förändringar som det medförde analyserades i detalj. Parallellt analyserades organisatorisk makt, kontroll och arbetsidentitet. Undersökningen beskriver hur det nya systemet gradvis anpassades till hemvården efter ett initialt motstånd. Under själva implementering av systemet ifrågasattes tidigare arbetspraxis och inställningen till den eftersom arbetspraxisens materiella omgivning förändrades. Det teoretiska tillvägagångssättet i att undersöka arbetspraxis framhäver vårdarens agerande i förändringsprocessen. Resultatet av forskningen visar vikten av realistiska målsättningar, givande av gruppstöd med återkoppling samt förmåga att anpassa sig till det oväntade vid införande av informationssystem.

Efficient installed base information management and utilization in global after sales service business

This Master´s thesis explores how the a global industrial corporation’s after sales service department should arrange its installed base management practices in order to maintain and utilize the installed base information effectively. Case company has product-related records, such as product’s lifecycle information, service history information and information about product’s performance. Information is collected and organized often case by case, therefore the systematic and effective use of installed base information is difficult also the overview of installed base is missing. The goal of the thesis study was to find out how the case company can improve the installed base maintenance and management practices and improve the installed base information availability and reliability. Installed base information management practices were first examined through the literature. The empirical research was conducted by the interviews and questionnaire survey, targeted to the case company’s service department. The research purpose was to find out the challenges related to case company´s service department’s information management practices. The study also identified the installed base information needs and improvement potential in the availability of information. Based on the empirical research findings, recommendations for improve installed base management practices and information availability were created. Grounding of the recommendations, the case company is suggested the following proposals for action: Service report development, improving the change management process, ensuring the quality of the product documentation in early stages of product life cycle and decision to improve installed base management practices.

Making Sense of Shared Leadership. A case study of leadership processes and practices without formal leadership structure in the team context

Leadership is essential for the effectiveness of the teams and organizations they are part of. The challenges facing organizations today require an exhaustive review of the strategic role of leadership. In this context, it is necessary to explore new types of leadership capable of providing an effective response to new needs. The presentday situations, characterized by complexity and ambiguity, make it difficult for an external leader to perform all leadership functions successfully. Likewise, knowledge-based work requires providing professional groups with sufficient autonomy to perform leadership functions. This study focuses on shared leadership in the team context. Shared leadership is seen as an emergent team property resulting from the distribution of leadership influence across multiple team members. Shared leadership entails sharing power and influence broadly among the team members rather than centralizing it in the hands of a single individual who acts in the clear role of a leader. By identifying the team itself as a key source of influence, this study points to the relational nature of leadership as a social construct where leadership is seen as social process of relating processes that are co-constructed by several team members. Based on recent theoretical developments concerned with relational, practice-based and constructionist approaches to the study of leadership processes, this thesis proposes the study of leadership interactions, working processes and practices to focus on the construction of direction, alignment and commitment. During the research process, critical events, activities, working processes and practices of a case team have been examined and analyzed with the grounded theory –approach in the terms of shared leadership. There are a variety of components to this complex process and a multitude of factors that may influence the development of shared leadership. The study suggests that the development process of shared leadership is a common sense -making process and consists of four overlapping dimensions (individual, social, structural, and developmental) to work with as a team. For shared leadership to emerge, the members of the team must offer leadership services, and the team as a whole must be willing to rely on leadership by multiple team members. For these individual and collective behaviors to occur, the team members must believe that offering influence to and accepting it from fellow team members are welcome and constructive actions. Leadership emerges when people with differing world views use dialogue and collaborative learning to create spaces where a shared common purpose can be achieved while a diversity of perspectives is preserved and valued. This study also suggests that this process can be supported by different kinds of meaning-making and process tools. Leadership, then, does not reside in a person or in a role, but in the social system. The built framework integrates the different dimensions of shared leadership and describes their relationships. This way, the findings of this study can be seen as a contribution to the understanding of what constitutes essential aspects of shared leadership in the team context that can be of theoretical value in terms of advancing the adoption and development process of shared leadership. In the real world, teams and organizations can create conditions to foster and facilitate the process. We should encourage leaders and team members to approach leadership as a collective effort that the team can be prepared for, so that the response is rapid and efficient.

Indicent reporting in shipping. Experiences and best practices for the Baltic Sea

Incident and near miss reporting is one of the proactive tools of safety management. By analyzing incidents and near misses and by corrective actions, severe accidents can potentially be avoided. Near miss and incident reporting is widely used in many riskprone industries such as aviation or chemical industry. In shipping incident and near miss reporting is required by the mandatory safety management system International Safety Management Code (ISM Code). However, in several studies the conclusion has been that incidents are reported poorly in the shipping industry. The aim of this report is to highlight the best practices for incident reporting in shipping and to support the shipping industry in the better utilization of incident reporting information. The study consists of three parts: 1) voluntary, shared reporting systems in shipping (international experiences), 2) interview study at four shipping companies in Sweden and in Finland (best practices), 3) expert workshop on incident reporting (problems and solutions). Preconditions for a functional reporting system are an existing no blame culture, commitment of the top management, feedback, good communication, training and an easy-to-use system. Although preconditions are met, problems can still appear, for example due to psychological, interpersonal or nationality-related reasons. In order to keep the reporting system functioning, the shipping company must be committed to maintain and develop the system and to tackle the problems. The whole reporting process from compiling, handling and analyzing a report, creating corrective actions and implementing them has to be handled properly in order to gain benefits from the reporting system. In addition to avoiding accidents, the functional reporting system can also offer other benefits by increasing safety awareness, by improving the overall safety and working conditions onboard, by enhancing team work and communication onboard and between ships and the land-based organization of shipping companies. Voluntary shared reporting systems are supported in the shipping industry in principle, but their development in the Baltic Sea is still in its infancy and the potential benefits of sharing the reports have not been realized. On the basis of this study we recommend that a common reporting system be developed for the Baltic Sea area which all the ships operating in the area could use regardless of their flag. Such a wider system could prevent some of the problems related to the current national systems. There would be more incident cases available in the database and this would support anonymity and thus encourage shipping companies to report to a shared database more frequently. A shared reporting system would contribute to the sharing of experiences and to the wider use of incident information in the shipping industry.

Evaluating the Maturity of Data Management Practices in a Major Energy Provider Company

Data is the most important asset of a company in the information age. Other assets, such as technology, facilities or products can be copied or reverse-engineered, employees can be brought over, but data remains unique to every company. As data management topics are slowly moving from unknown unknowns to known unknowns, tools to evaluate and manage data properly are developed and refined. Many projects are in progress today to develop various maturity models for evaluating information and data management practices. These maturity models come in many shapes and sizes: from short and concise ones meant for a quick assessment, to complex ones that call for an expert assessment by experienced consultants. In this paper several of them, made not only by external inter-organizational groups and authors, but also developed internally at a Major Energy Provider Company (MEPC) are juxtaposed and thoroughly analyzed. Apart from analyzing the available maturity models related to Data Management, this paper also selects the one with the most merit and describes and analyzes using it to perform a maturity assessment in MEPC. The utility of maturity models is two-fold: descriptive and prescriptive. Besides recording the current state of Data Management practices maturity by performing the assessments, this maturity model is also used to chart the way forward. Thus, after the current situation is presented, analysis and recommendations on how to improve it based on the definitions of higher levels of maturity are given. Generally, the main trend observed was the widening of the Data Management field to include more business and “soft” areas (as opposed to technical ones) and the change of focus towards business value of data, while assuming that the underlying IT systems for managing data are “ideal”, that is, left to the purely technical disciplines to design and maintain. This trend is not only present in Data Management but in other technological areas as well, where more and more attention is given to innovative use of technology, while acknowledging that the strategic importance of IT as such is diminishing.

Measuring the performance of corporate events : an empirical study of measuring practices in Finnish companies

Corporate events as an effective part of marketing communications strategy seem to be underestimated in Finnish companies. In the rest of the Europe and the USA, investments in events are increasing, and their share of the marketing budget is significant. The growth of the industry may be explained by the numerous advantages and opportunities that events provide for attendees, such as face-to-face marketing, enhancing corporate image, building relationships, increasing sales, and gathering information. In order to maximize these benefits and return on investment, specific measurement strategies are required, yet there seems to exist a lack of understanding of how event performance should be perceived or evaluated. To address this research gap, this research attempts to describe the perceptions of and strategies for evaluating corporate event performance in the Finnish events industry. First, corporate events are discussed in terms of definitions and characteristics, typologies, and their role in marketing communications. Second, different theories on evaluating corporate event performance are presented and analyzed. Third, a conceptual model is presented based on the literature review, which serves as a basis for the empirical research conducted as an online questionnaire. The empirical findings are to a great extent in line with the existing literature, suggesting that there remains a lack of understanding corporate event performance evaluation, and challenges arise in determining appropriate measurement procedures for it. Setting clear objectives for events is a significant aspect of the evaluation process, since the outcomes of events are usually evaluated against the preset objectives. The respondent companies utilize many of the individual techniques that were recognized in theory, such as calculating the number of sales leads and delegates. However, some of the measurement tools may require further investments and resources, thus restricting their application especially in smaller companies. In addition, there seems to be a lack of knowledge of the most appropriate methods in different contexts, which take into account the characteristics of the organizing party as well as the size and nature of the event. The lack of inhouse expertise enhances the need for third-party service-providers in solving problems of corporate event measurement.

Sivistyksestä sivilisaatioon. Kulttuurikäsitys J. V. Snellmanin historiallisessa ajattelussa

From Bildung to Civilisation. Conception of Culture in J. V. Snellman’s Historical Thinking The research explores Johan Vilhelm Snellman’s (1806–1881) conception of culture in the context of his historical thinking. Snellman was a Finnish, Swedish-speaking journalist, teacher and thinker, who held a central position in the Finnish national discourse during the nineteenth century. He has been considered as one of the leading theorists of a Finnish nation, writing widely about the themes such as the advancement of the national education, Finnish language and culture. Snellman is already a widely studied person in Finnish intellectual history, often characterised as a follower of G. W. F. Hegel’s philosophical system. My own research introduces a new kind of approach on Snellman’s texts, emphasising the conceptual level of his thought. With this approach, my aim is to broaden the Finnish research tradition on conceptual history. I consider my study as a cultural history of concepts, belonging also to the field of intellectual history. My focus is on one hand on the close reading of Snellman’s texts and on the other hand on contextualising his texts to the European intellectual tradition of the time. A key concept of Snellman’s theoretical thinking is his concept of bildning, which can be considered as a Swedish counterpart of the German concept of Bildung. The Swedish word incorporated all the main elements of the German concept. It could mean education or the so-called high culture, but most fundamentally it was about the self-formation of the individual. This is also the context in which Snellman’s concept of bildning has often been interpreted. In the study, I use the concept of bildning as a starting point of my research but I broaden my focus on the cognate concepts such as culture (kultur), spirit (anda) and civilisation. The purpose of my study is thus to illustrate how Snellman used and modified these concepts and from these observations to draw a conclusion about the nature of his conception of culture. Snellman was an early Finnish philosopher of history but also interested in the practice of the writing of history. He did not write any historical presentations himself but followed the publications in the field of history and introduced European historical writing to the Finnish, Swedish-speaking reading audience in his newspapers. The primary source material consists of different types of Snellman’s texts, including philosophical writings, lecture material, newspaper articles and private letters. I’m reading Snellman’s texts in the context of other texts produced both by his Finnish predecessors and contemporaries and by Swedish, German and French writers. Snellman’s principal philosophical works, Versuch einer spekulativen Entwicklung der Idee der Persönlichkeit (1841) and Läran om staten (1842), were both written abroad. Both of the works were contributions to contemporary debates on the international level, especially in Germany and Sweden. During the 1840s and 1850s Snellman had two newspapers of his own, Saima and Litteraturblad, which were directed towards the Swedish-speaking educated class. Both of the newspapers were very popular and their circulations were among the largest of their day in Finland. The topics of his articles and reviews covered literature, poetry, philosophy and education as well as issues concerning the economic, industrial and technical development in Finland. In his newspapers Snellman not only brought forth his own ideas but also spread the knowledge of European events and ideas to his readers. He followed very carefully the cultural and political situation in Western Europe. He also followed European magazines and newspapers and was well acquainted with German, French and also English literature – and of course Swedish literature to with which he had the closest ties. In his newspapers Snellman wrote countless number of literary reviews and critics, introducing his readers to European literature. The study consists of three main chapters in which I explore my research question in three different, yet overlapping contexts. In the first of these chapters, I analyse Snellman’n theoretical thinking and his concepts of bildning, kultur, anda and civilisation in the context of earlier cultural discourse in Finland as well as the tradition of German idealistic philosophy and neo-humanism. With the Finnish cultural discourse I refer to the early cultural discussion in Finland, which emerged after the year 1809, when Finland became an autonomous entity of its own as a Grand Duchy of Russia. Scholars of the Academy of Turku opened a discussion on the themes such as the state of national consciousness, the need for national education and the development of the Finnish language as a national language of Finland. Many of these academics were also Snellman’s teachers in the early years of his academic career and Snellman clearly formulated his own ideas in the footsteps of these Finnish predecessors. In his theoretical thinking Snellman was a collectivist; according to him an individual should always be understood in connection with the society, its values and manners, as well as to the traditions of a culture where an individual belongs to. In his philosophy of the human spirit Snellman was in many ways a Hegelian but his notion of education or ‘bildning’ includes also elements that connect him with the wider tradition of German intellectual history, namely the neo-humanist tradition and, at least to some extent, to the terminology of J. G. Herder or J. G. Fichte, for example. In this chapter, I also explore Snellman’s theory of history. In his historical thinking Snellman was an idealist, believing in the historical development of the human spirit (Geist in German language). One can characterise his theory of history by stating that it is a mixture of a Hegelian triumph of the spirit and Herderian emphasis on humanity (Humanität) and the relative nature of ‘Bildung’. For Snellman, the process of ‘bildning’ or ‘Bildung’ is being realised in historical development through the actions of human beings. Snellman believed in the historical development of the human civilization. Still Snellman himself considered that he had abandoned Hegel’s idea about the process of world history. Snellman – rightly or wrongly – criticised Hegel of emphasising the universal end of history (the realisation of the freedom of spirit) at the expense of the historical plurality and the freedom of each historical era. Snellman accused Hegel of neglecting the value and independency of different historical cultures and periods by imposing the abstract norm, the fulfilment of the freedom of spirit, as the ultimate goal of history. The historicist in Snellman believed in the individuality of each historical period; each historical era or culture had values, traditions and modes of thought of its own. This historicist in Snellman could not accept the talk about one measure or the end of history. On the other hand Snellman was also a universalist. He believed that mankind had a common task and that task was the development of ‘Bildung’, freedom or humanity. The second main chapter consists of two parts. In the first part, I explore the Finnish nationalistic discourse from the cultural point of view by analysing the notions such as a nation, national spirit or national language and showing how Snellman formulated his own ideas in a dialogic situation, participating in the Finnish discourse but also reacting to international discussions on the themes of the nation and nationality. For Snellman nationality was to a great extent the collective knowledge and customs or practices of the nation. Snellman stated that nationality is to be considered as a form of ‘bildning’. This could be seen not simply as affection for the fatherland but also for the mental identity of the nation, its ways of thinking, its practices, national language, customs and laws, the history of the nation. The simplest definition of nationality that Snellman gives is that nationality is the social life of the people. In the second part of the chapter I exam Snellman’s historical thinking and his understanding about historical development, interaction between different nations and cultures in the course of history, as well as the question of historical change; how do cultures or civilisations develop and who are the creators of culture? Snellman did not believe in one dominating culture but understood the course of history as a dialogue between different cultures. On the other hand, his views are very Eurocentric – here he follows the ideas of Hegel or for example the French historian François Guizot – for Snellman Europe represented the virtue of pluralism; in Europe one could see the diversity of cultures which, on the other hand, were fundamentally based on a common Christian tradition. In the third main chapter, my focus is on the writing of history, more precisely on Snellman’s ideas on the nature of history as a science and on the proper way of writing historical presentations. Snellman wrote critics on the works of history and introduced his readers to the writing of history especially in France, Sweden and German-speaking area – in some extend also in Britain. Snellman’s collectivistic view becomes evident also in his reviews on historical writing. For Snellman history was not about the actions of the states and their heads, nor about the records of ruling families and battles fought. He repeatedly stressed that history is a discipline that seeks to provide a total view of a phenomenon. A historian should not only collect information on historical events, since this information touches only the surface of a certain epoch or civilisation; he has to understand an epoch as totality. This required an understanding about the major contours in history, connections between civilisations and an awareness of significant turning points in historical development. In addition, it required a holistic understanding about a certain culture or historical era, including also the so-called inner life of a specific nation, a common people and their ways of life. Snellman wrote explicitly about ‘cultural history’ in his texts, referring to this kind of broad understanding of a society. In historical writing Snellman found this kind of broader view from the works of the French historians such as François Guizot and Jules Michelet. In all of these chapters, I elaborate the conceptual dimension of Snellman’s historical thinking. In my study I argue that Snellman not only adopted the German concepts of Bildung or Kultur in his own thinking but also developed the Swedish concepts in a way that include personal and innovative aspects. Snellman’s concept of bildning is not only a translation from ‘Bildung’ but he uses the Swedish concept in a versatile way that includes both the moral aspect of human development and social dimension of a human life. Along with ‘bildning’ Snellman used also the terms ‘kultur’ and ‘civilisation’ when referring to the totality of a certain nation or historical era, including both the so-called high culture (arts, science, religion) and the modes of thought as well as ways of life of the people as a whole. Unlike many of his Finnish contemporaries, Snellman did not use civilisation as a negative concept, lacking the moral essence of German term ‘Bildung’ or ‘Kultur’. Instead, for Snellman civilisation was a neutral term and here he comes close to the French tradition of using the term. In the study I argue that Snellman’s conception of culture in fact includes a synthesis of the German tradition of ‘Bildung’ and the French tradition of ‘civilisation’.

From electronic spare part catalog to eBusiness: Finding the best practices

Companies and organizations business activities rely on information. IT systems that manage master data must provide the highest level of service, world-class scalability and reliable information. This study discusses product information and how it can support the creation of a spare part catalog and the launching of eBusiness. The study consists of a theoretical and empirical part. The theoretical part contains a literature review and a framework for the analysis. For the empirical study two companies were selected and their information management processes were studied and analyzed based on the framework. The empirical results indicate that the challenges the companies face reflect the ones that can be found in the literature study. The results of the empirical study also show that the companies had recognized the issues which need to be developed and had recognized trends in eBusiness and product information management.