Browsing by Subject "qualitative research"
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(2024)Highly skilled migrants are an exception in otherwise tightening immigration policies in Europe, as they are welcomed and competed by most countries due to aspired effects to competitiveness and economic growth of countries. Meanwhile, the effects to shrinking and ageing population underline the need for immigration. However, policies to retain highly skilled migrants seem to lack concrete measures, and research regarding integration of highly skilled migrants seem to focus on their labor market and workplace integration as workforce and economic advantage, rather than on their integration as individuals with need to feel a sense of belonging to other parts of society, as well. Therefore, the objective of this master’s thesis is to increase the understanding of highly skilled migrants’ perceptions and experiences of the process of social integration, as well as the factors influencing to them. The theoretical and conceptual framework of this thesis is constructed around two key concepts: highly skilled migrant refers to a migrant with a tertiary education degree and specific skills, while the process of social integration is defined in this thesis as a dimension of the process of integration, which refers to the sense of belonging of the migrant, as well as to the role of society in accepting the migrant. The regional context of this thesis is Helsinki metropolitan area in Finland due to its large number of foreigners and the importance of the information and communication technology sector in the area. In order to achieve the objective of this thesis, four highly skilled migrants working in the ICT sector and living in Helsinki metropolitan area were interviewed and requested to write diaries. The gathered research material was then analyzed by applying thematic analysis. This thesis indicates that highly skilled migrants perceive social integration as a subjective process, which they experience mainly as their own responsibility. The process is, however, influenced by the attitudes, expectations and atmosphere of different levels of the society. The experiences of highly skilled migrants indicate that they are welcomed especially because of their social status as highly skilled, as the negative experiences seemed to be mainly related to their foreignness. The sense of belonging was also observed to be influenced positively by having a citizenship of a European country. Connections with Finnish people and cultural context particularly have a strong impact on the sense of belonging to society, and studies in Finland prior to working were perceived as having a positive impact to that. On the other hand, creating connections and relationships with Finns was perceived as difficult, especially due to challenges in getting to know Finns and to learn Finnish language. Although this thesis indicates that workplace can play a significant role in the process of social integration, work is perceived as only one part of life, and therefore, further examination of other dimensions of integration regarding highly skilled migrants is needed.
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(2017)The theoretical context of this qualitative study are the leadership in early childhood education and the organizational change. The leadership and the change of leadership are studied generally and then the distributed leadership and the distributed organization are studied specifically. This study examines how teachers and leaders view the distributed leadership and what kind of skills the leaders and the workers need in the organization of distributed leadership and how they view the organizational change. This is qualitative phenomenology research. The material of the study was collected at half structured interviews which were taken part in six teachers and two leaders from the city of Hamina during November and December 2017. The interviews were recorded and transcribed for analysis. The analysis was done with the methods of content analysis. This study shows that the leadership in early childhood education is in change and the leadership meets new challenges. Distributed leadership challenges both the leaders and the workers. The results of the study show that the interviewed teachers and leaders see distributed leadership as teamwork and interactional work custom. The distributed leadership was difficult to execute, because teachers worked as leaders without the status of the leader. The interviewed viewed that the difficulties of distributed organization are indefinite structures and work tasks of leadership and too large entireties of leadership. The interviewed viewed that the organizational change was unsuccessful. The interviewed teachers and the leader felt that they didn't have an opportunity to influence the change and the given reasons for doing the organizational change were incoherent and the results of the change were not estimated. They would like to increase the number of leaders and clear the determinations of work roles and responsibilities. This study suggests that the city of Hamina should increase the competence of the leaders and the personnel. In practice distributed leadership means investing the knowhow of leadership and working community skills. The human resource management and the motivating of the personnel are the main challenges in the future. Qualitative early childhood education is possible only with the motivated workers.
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(2018)Objectives. The purpose of this study is to describe, analyze and interpret the way novice class teachers see school bullying. The secondary purpose is to describe how peer harassment affects the novice teachers’ job. In 2010-centery studies, school bullying has been seen as a form of negative social behavior between pupils (Repo, 2015; Herkama, 2012). Teachers have to focus more and more on teaching social skills to pupils rather than the actual teaching. This has been associated with younger teachers’ increased stress levels at work and even plans on switching ca-reers (Aho, 2011). This study examines the education side of teacher job at the context of school bullying. Methods. This study is a qualitative research from the point of view of phenomenography. The material has been produced in a group chat between three novice teachers and the interviewer. All teachers have graduated during the last year and worked their first year as teachers. Besides of novice teachers I will also call them young teachers at this study, since all of them were under thirty years old. Results and conclusion. The peer harassment has changed because of new technology and smart phones. The term ‘school bullying’ has become an inadequate way in describing the reality of the bullying experiences that pupils have to deal with. From novice teachers’ perspective, it seemed that low social skills of pupils were the main reason why there are so much conflicts be-tween pupils in everyday life. The actual school bullying was rare, but the preventative jobs, such as conflict solving, took lots of time from teaching and learning in the class. Decision mak-ing, insecurity regarding the effectivity of one’s own practices as well as co-operation with the parents were experienced as a burden with negative effects on teaching. In conclusion, bullying and the bullying-preventive work increases the overall workload of teachers and takes up time and resources from the actual teaching.
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(2018)There exists an extensive body of research on homosexuality, yet only a few studies address local meanings of homosexuality and still fewer attempt to understand the processes that construct these meanings and the values and beliefs of the people that share these meanings. Such studies would be particularly relevant in India as a developing and highly pluralistic country where the legal status of homosexuality has been in a state of flux. The unique history and religious diversity in India have shaped the way in which different communities come to understand homosexuality. Influences of both colonization and tradition are salient and constantly interacting, yet in many ways conflicting with each other. To explore these influences and intersections in relation to conceptions of homosexuality, the social representation theory was used as a methodological framework. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in Bangalore with six families from the urban middle class representing the major religions of Hinduism, Islam and Christianity. Out of these six families, two families from each of the three religions participated. For each family, one member belonged to the youngest generation (18+ years of age), one to the middle generation and one to the grandparents’ generation. As Bangalore is the second fastest growing metropolis in India, it provided a good background to explore potential influences of modernisation. The inter-generational and inter-religious approach helped to provide insights on how these categories, in addition to their national identity as Indians, entwine and frame these participants’ representations of homosexuality. Across religions and generations, three representations of homosexuality were identified: nature, nurture and culture. In the first, homosexuality was categorized in terms of what is ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’, in the second in terms of ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ and in the third, in terms of ‘deviant’ and ‘non-deviant’. Despite these convergent primary categorizations, participants’ ages, religions and gendered perceptions of what constitutes homosexuality intersected in diverse yet specific and patterned ways. My analysis sheds light on the functions served by these representations, local practices and customs, as well as social change in India with respect to meanings, understandings and practices of homosexuality.
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(2012)In pharmaceutical industry GMP compliance and quality of operations can be ensured with quality management system (QMS). QMS is an operational system, which consist of multiple different elements depending on the size of the company and nature and complexity of its operations. For the QMS to be functional, documented and defined operations need to be managed and monitored systematically. Conducting internal audits has been considered necessary with regard to QMS, though it has not always been perceived as adding value or seen as an opportunity to utilise more fully. Internal audits are mainly utilized to control compliance to requirements. However, there are possibilities to utilise it more in improving and developing operations, preparation to external audits, quality risk assessment, finding out the best practices, basis for decision making, learning experience as well as the assessment of functionality and effectiveness of the QMS. The aim of this study was to examine the utilisation of internal audits in Orion (Espoo) and find solutions to improve the utilisation of internal audits with QMS. The focus was on how internal audits can monitor and guide QMS and what is required from internal audits for monitoring and guidance of QMS. These aims were approached qualitatively by conducting semi-standardized open-ended interviews. Interviewees (n=9) were selected from both auditor and auditee side and they had their background in quality assurance or production. Data compiled from these interviews was analysed mainly by qualitative methods, using also some quantitative analysis. Monitoring of the QMS can be looked at as the starting point to guide QMS. Valuable information can be gathered with internal audits with regard to QMS. By utilising this information, internal audit process and QMS can be improved and the quality of operations can be ensured. Based on this work internal audits can be utilised to monitor and have the potential to guide QMS under certain conditions. Internal audit topics need to be systematically selected, QMS needs to be monitored and guided based on the internal audit findings, flow and distribution of information needs to be efficient and flexible, and internal audits should be better utilised and managed. Further research is needed on the development and deployment of tools to aid better utilisation of internal audits in the control of QMS. Also ways to measure the effects of internal auditing should be further investigated.
Now showing items 1-5 of 5