Study of Online Marketing Communications and Orientation Practices in Finnish Foreign Missions

The purpose of this study was to investigate how and via which online channels Finnish missions market their open positions to foreign job seekers and what kind of an image these job seekers have of Finnish missions as employers. By doing this research, we wanted to know which media are used the most in the recruitment processes of these missions. We also wanted to find out whether Finnish missions are considered attractive employers in the eyes of the foreign candidates and what made the respondents of the survey interested in applying for work to a Finnish mission. In addition, the study investigated how locally engaged personnel in Finnish missions are oriented and integrated into their duties and the overall Finnish work culture, which might be in many cases very different from the host country. In addition, the purpose of the thesis was to identify what Finnish work culture is from foreigners' point of view and how it appears to them. The theoretical part of the thesis first examined the different online marketing channels and their utilization in employer branding and recruitment. Secondly, the orientation of foreign employees, orientation in multicultural environments and the dimensions of national cultures were examined. The empirical part of this thesis was a qualitative research conducted as a Webropol survey in fall 2014. The target group of the survey was the locally hired personnel of Finnish foreign missions. There was a total of 30 respondents. The findings of this research revealed that the employer image of these missions is, overall, very positive. The results showed that Finnish missions are considered reliable employers providing good working conditions. Also, as most of the open positions were filled by word-of-mouth, development proposals – such as employer branding strategy and active online presence – were suggested to help the missions in promoting their open positions and their image as employers. The findings also revealed that there is some variation regarding the orientation of foreign employees in Finnish missions. In general, the orientation was considered to be good. However, there was some room for improvement, e.g. in the content of the orientation process. Additionally, the findings revealed that taking culture into consideration in orientation is important so that foreign employees learn the Finnish work culture, which from foreign employees’ point of view was usually seen to embody equality, responsibility and punctuality. Development proposals, such as creating precise orientation plans and including culture in the orientation process, were suggested

International Business Negotiations between Finnish and Chinese business people: A Cultural Approach

International companies nowadays have vast operations in China. Furthermore, international business negotiations between Western and Chinese companies have increased rapidly during the past couple of decades. Understanding the Chinese culture thus has become vital to Western negotiators. Finnish corporations also have intensive cooperation with the Chinese corporations, Finnish businesses have subsidiaries in China and future business assets for Finnish companies are in China. Finnish-Chinese business negotiations have not yet been studied, therefore this thesis attempts to fill this research gap. Firstly, cultural comparison of Finnish and Chinese cultures is done through project GLOBE research selected cultural dimensions (performance orientation, future orientation, individualism vs. collectivism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance). Both Finnish and Chinese cultures and business behavior as well as previous negotiation research findings are presented. Secondly, empirical research was conducted through semi-structured qualitative interviews of eight high level Finnish business executives with extensive personal experience negotiating with the Chinese. The interview data was analyzed through content analysis and inductive categorization method, where similar responses of all interviewees were categorized together. According to this study Finnish and Chinese get along well in the international business negotiations. The most important Chinese cultural factors, face (mianzi) and relationships (guanxi), both were discovered to have great impact on Finnish-Chinese business negotiations. Altogether eight factors were found to impact Chinese negotiations: the Chinese government, Chinese politics, Chinese negotiation tactics, face, relationships, language barriers, understanding problems, and individual characteristics of the Chinese people. All these factors a Finnish negotiator has to take into consideration before entering into Chinese negotiations. Furthermore, this study provides practical guidelines for Finnish managers entering into Chinese negotiations and list of qualities a competent Finnish negotiator should have.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

The role of entrepreneurial competencies in Finnish SMEs

Previous studies indicate a lack of research in entrepreneurial competencies (ECs) in Finland. Therefore, the objective of this study is to investigate the role of ECs in Finnish small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The three research questions of the study include: What are the important ECs in Finnish SMEs? What is the most important EC in Finnish SMEs? How are the important and the most important ECs used? This study is qualitative in nature and follows a deductive research approach. As a data collection method, semi-structured interviews were conducted and the respondents were from six Finnish SMEs in four different industries, that is, cosmetic, health, food and film industry. A cross-industry analyses of the six SMEs were carried out to answer the research questions and to reach the objective of the study. The findings of this study suggest that relationship, commitment, learning orientation, strategic, innovativeness, decision-making and problem solving competencies are important in Finnish SMEs. In addition, this study identified how the aforementioned ECs are used. Moreover, based on different industry analysis (cosmetic, health, food and film), relationship competence was identified as the most important EC. This study offers theoretical contribution to the existing studies on ECs in Finnish context by offering insights on the important and the most important EC. The managerial implications of this study include that besides commitment, learning orientation, strategic, innovativeness, decision-making and problem solving competencies, the major focus must be on building relationship competence. This can be achieved, through effective communication with employees within the organization and by building ties and trust between an entrepreneur and his/her business networks.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

Exploring international students’ goals for full degree mobility inFinnish higher education institutions

Abstract. This thesis explores the goals of international students pursuing full-degree mobility in Finnish higher education institutions. It aims to identify how these goals evolve over the course of their studies. The research questions focus on the goals of students, the achievement goal orientation profiles of international students, and the stability of the reported goals throughout their degree program. The research used semi-structured in-depth interviews to collect data from 22 international students pursuing a full degree in Finland or who recently graduated from a Finnish educational institution. The study identifies several goals that motivate international students to pursue a degree in Finland, including personal growth, career development, cultural enrichment, and access to high quality education. The research also identifies different achievement goal orientation profiles among the participants, with some students exhibiting a mastery-oriented orientation and others a performance-oriented orientation. The study reveals that the stability of achievement goal orientation profiles varies among international students, with some maintaining a consistent orientation throughout their degree programs. In contrast, others experience changes in their approach to goals and success. This research provides insights into the goal-setting process for adult learners pursuing a full degree in higher education institutions in Finland and suggests several areas for further research

What Causes Finnish Family Farmers Feel Successful? The Role of Resources and Entrepreneurial Characteristics

This study investigates the influences of resources and entrepreneurial characteristics on perceived success in familyfarms using the Resource-Based Theory and Entrepreneurial Orientation perspectives. Resources and entrepreneurial orientation are used to identify success perceptions. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling were applied to the survey data of 805 Finnish family farmers. Family farmers rate their skills as good, and their abilities of proactiveness and self-realization success as high. The results suggest that both resources and entrepreneurial orientation affect the perceived success of family farmers, although the role of entrepreneurial orientation is relatively small. Co-variability between resources and entrepreneurial orientation is positive, addressingthe change towards the same direction. This study promotes the understanding of the family perspective and its role in the successful use of resources and entrepreneurial capabilities in farming and offers a developed construct for family farm business research

Market orientation in Finnish pharmacies

Purpose of study: The concept of market orientation has been studied since 1970's. The dimensions of this concept have been described slightly differently by different researchers. Though this concept has been studied also among SMEs, even in Finland, there has not been a single-industry study focusing on Finnish pharmacies. The main objective of this study was to gain research information of market orientation within Finnish pharmacies, and whether this strategic paradigm can be related to Finnish pharmacists' strategy work. Methodology: Online survey was conducted in fall 2013 to collect the research data of this study. Invitation to this survey was sent to 584 pharmacists throughout Finland. 118 effective responses with response rate 20.2 per cent were received. Data analysis was conducted in two phases. In the first phase Exploratory factor analysis was used to identify the importance of market orientation to Finnish pharmacy owners. In the second phase t test and One-way Anova were used to test differences between demography variables sub groups among respondents. Findings: One of the key findings of this study was that Finnish pharmacists did recognize dimensions of market orientation important to their strategy work. This study shows that these entrepreneurs were most active in responsiveness, while in information generation and dissemination they were slightly less active. This outcome is in line with the findings of previous research done among Finnish SMEs. Another key finding was that those pharmacists who possess PD education were less market oriented compared to those who do not have this further education. This would be somewhat unexpected result. The results of this study suggest that market orientation is relevant concept in the context of Finnish pharmacies. Such concept and related frameworks, e.g. MARKOR, could offer a guideline for entrepreneurs in this field of business as it confronts the competitive challenges of 21st century

Na nyingine kutoka nje ya Tanzania : Discussions of Tanzanian Sign Language within a demissionizing context

This paper undertakes an empirical investigation of lexical similarity and influence between Finnish Sign Language and Tanzanian Sign Language, situated within the context of demissionization and postcolonial theory. To date, no study along these lines has been undertaken, despite decades of history of Finnish missionaries and teachers in Deaf schools in Tanzania, accompanied by a longstanding record of educational and development support from Finland. By providing historical background information of the Tanzanian Deaf community and the development of Tanzanian Sign Language, this research further provides a contemporary overview of Tanzanian Sign Language. Over 900 lexical items from Tanzanian Sign Language were compared with signs with equivalent meanings in Finnish Sign Language to determine the extent of influence of Finnish Sign Language within the language. The signs were analyzed based on the Prosodic Model, comparing four main parameters: handshape, place of articulation, movement, and palm orientation. Signs were classified as either identical, similar, or different. This study provides African sign linguistics a space within the framework of postcolonial theories and decolonization

Identifying Cultural and Cognitive Proximity between Managers and Customers in Tornio and Haparanda Cross Border Region

Daily intercultural interactions in cross-border regions such as those between customers and managers can be a source of knowledge and ideas. However, such interactions can pose distinctive constraints and opportunities for learning and exchange of ideas. This study adopts a relatively fine–grained quantitative approach to study elements of cognitive and cultural proximity which have a major impact on these interactions. It is based on a survey of 91 managers of small service firms and 312 customers in the twin city of Tornio and Haparanda on the border between Finland and Sweden. Seven elements of proximity were identified and measured. Six elements of perceived cognitive and cultural proximity including values, conservative values towards new ideas, knowledge and use of technology, use of a foreign language, sufficiently focusing or providing specific details and ways of solving problems were found significant in terms of shaping perceptions of Swedish and Finnish managers and customers, which shape these interactions. The results enhance our understanding of how daily cross-border intercultural can be examined in the context of cross-border regional knowledge transfer

Perfectionism and achievement goals in young Finnish ice-hockey players aspiring to make the Under-16 national team

Research on perfectionism suggests that is it useful to differentiate between perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns. Regarding the 2 x 2 achievement goal framework, the usefulness of this differentiation was recently demonstrated in a study with university student athletes (Stoeber, Stoll, Pescheck, & Otto, 2008, Study 2), in which it was found that perfectionistic strivings were associated with mastery-approach and performance-approach goals and perfectionistic concerns with mastery-avoidance, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals. Because the study was largely exploratory and only used non-elite athletes, the aim of the present research was to replicate and extend these findings by investigating a sample of 138 young, elite ice-hockey players, while adding further measures of perfectionism and using structural equation modelling (SEM) to confirm the relationships between perfectionistic strivings, perfectionistic concerns,and the 2 x 2 achievement goals. The SEM results showed that, in elite athletes also, perfectionistic strivings are associated with mastery-approach and performance-approach goals, whereas perfectionistic concerns are associated with masteryavoidance, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals. Our findings corroborate the importance of differentiating between perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns when studying perfectionism in sports, because only perfectionistic concerns (and not perfectionistic strivings) are associated with maladaptive patterns of achievement goals

Comparing “cosmopolitanism” : taste, nation and global culture in Finland and the UK

This paper adds a comparative perspective to the study of taste, cosmopolitanism and social organisation. Drawing on material provided by two similar projects in the UK and Finland it explores the relationships between national and cosmopolitan taste cultures. Whilst there have been some recent attempts to study taste in a comparative perspective, the weight of sociological inquiry into taste is focussed on specific national spaces, including the France of Bourdieu’s (1984) seminal contribution. This tendency persists even as the production and circulation of culture is increasingly accepted as global. Global culture is assumed to be the driver of cosmopolitan ways of being, but is also interpreted as a threat to distinct national cultures. Studies of taste provide an empirical setting where the lived experience of global culture and the ambiguities of cosmopolitanism can be observed. Based on interviews and focus group discussions from the UK and Finland, the paper broadly concurs with those critics who see cosmopolitanism in the context of the maintenance of privileged political or symbolic positions of classes/status groups