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Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate how Swedish actors in the hospitality industry work with sustainability and in what way they communicate this through digital channels. Research question:How do Swedish actors in the hospitality industry work with sustainability?How do Swedish actors in the hospitality industry choose to communicate their sustainability work? Methodology: The study is based on a qualitative research method with abductive approach. The qualitative methods that have been conducted consist of semi -structured interviews with ten respondents from nine companies, and observations of the respective companies' digital platforms. Furthermore, the collected material has been thematically analyzed. Analysis & Conclusion: The study's findings reveal that all respondents recognize the importance of sustainability communication. All of the companies questioned chose to work with sustainability in different ways, although the majority of respondents associated sustainability primarily with the environmental perspective. Several respondents, on the other hand, provided information on the social and economic perspectives of sustainability. Furthermore, the companies questioned choose to communicate their sustainability work outward as opposed to communicating internally, which was previously the norm. However, it is perceived as a challenge for companies to use digital channels to communicate their sustainability work and establish a clear view of responsibility for consumers. Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka hur svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen arbetar med hållbarhet och på vilket sätt de kommunicerar ut detta genom digitala kanaler. Forskningsfrågor:Hur arbetar svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen med hållbarhet?Hur väljer svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete? Metod: Studien bygger på en kvalitativ forskningsmetod med abduktiv ansats. De kvalitativa metoder som har genomförts består av semistrukturerade intervjuer med tio respondenter från nio företag, och observationer av respektive företags digitala plattformar. Vidare har det insamlade materialet tematiskt analyserats. Resultat & slutsats: Studiens resultat påvisar att det finns en medvetenhet kring vikten av hållbarhetskommunikation bland samtliga respondenter. Alla tillfrågade företag väljer att arbeta med hållbarhet på olika sätt, men de flesta respondenter kopplade hållbarhet i första hand till det miljömässiga perspektivet. De sociala och ekonomiska perspektiven upplystes däremot även mer eller mindre av flera av respondenterna. Vidare väljer de tillfråga företagen att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete utåt till skillnad från att enbart kommunicera internt, som tidigare var normen. Dock uppfattas det som en utmaning för företagen att använda digitala kanaler för att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete och skapa en tydlig ansvarsuppfattning hos konsumenterna.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate how Swedish actors in the hospitality industry work with sustainability and in what way they communicate this through digital channels. Research question:How do Swedish actors in the hospitality industry work with sustainability?How do Swedish actors in the hospitality industry choose to communicate their sustainability work? Methodology: The study is based on a qualitative research method with abductive approach. The qualitative methods that have been conducted consist of semi -structured interviews with ten respondents from nine companies, and observations of the respective companies' digital platforms. Furthermore, the collected material has been thematically analyzed. Analysis & Conclusion: The study's findings reveal that all respondents recognize the importance of sustainability communication. All of the companies questioned chose to work with sustainability in different ways, although the majority of respondents associated sustainability primarily with the environmental perspective. Several respondents, on the other hand, provided information on the social and economic perspectives of sustainability. Furthermore, the companies questioned choose to communicate their sustainability work outward as opposed to communicating internally, which was previously the norm. However, it is perceived as a challenge for companies to use digital channels to communicate their sustainability work and establish a clear view of responsibility for consumers. Syfte: Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka hur svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen arbetar med hållbarhet och på vilket sätt de kommunicerar ut detta genom digitala kanaler. Forskningsfrågor:Hur arbetar svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen med hållbarhet?Hur väljer svenska aktörer inom besöksnäringen att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete? Metod: Studien bygger på en kvalitativ forskningsmetod med abduktiv ansats. De kvalitativa metoder som har genomförts består av semistrukturerade intervjuer med tio respondenter från nio företag, och observationer av respektive företags digitala plattformar. Vidare har det insamlade materialet tematiskt analyserats. Resultat & slutsats: Studiens resultat påvisar att det finns en medvetenhet kring vikten av hållbarhetskommunikation bland samtliga respondenter. Alla tillfrågade företag väljer att arbeta med hållbarhet på olika sätt, men de flesta respondenter kopplade hållbarhet i första hand till det miljömässiga perspektivet. De sociala och ekonomiska perspektiven upplystes däremot även mer eller mindre av flera av respondenterna. Vidare väljer de tillfråga företagen att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete utåt till skillnad från att enbart kommunicera internt, som tidigare var normen. Dock uppfattas det som en utmaning för företagen att använda digitala kanaler för att kommunicera sitt hållbarhetsarbete och skapa en tydlig ansvarsuppfattning hos konsumenterna.

District heating is well expanded in the residential areas in Sweden, although not in detached house areas. Increased environmental concerns as well as steadily increasing electricity and oil prices make the detached houses sector a potential market for the district heating companies. District heating in low heat density areas is economically challenging for mainly two reasons: Firstly, construction of the district heating system implicate large investment costs. Secondly, the distributions costs, particularly for heat losses, will be larger in systems with low heat density. In order to maximize the line heat density and to reduce the investment cost per house a high rate of connections in the area is essential. Hence the economic prerequisites bring about a market situation in which the district heating companies are required to connect as many customers as possible within a specific area at the same time. The aim of this study is to find out what kind of strategies the district heating companies use for selling district heating to detached house owners. Our hope is that this study will help transferring knowledge and experiences between the district heating companies; that is identify efforts for new, successful strategies and to make some specific contributions to these new strategies. Methods used in this study were a survey that was sent to all of the members of The Swedish District Heating Association and telephone interviews with some of the companies that answered the survey. The rate of answers in the survey was 30 % and the number of interviews was 17. Results from the statistical analysis show that the size of a company is an important factor for the expansions rate. As measurements of company size either the company’s amount of customers, or the company’s total amount of heat sold per year, have been used. Not very surprising, large companies seem to connect a higher number of new customers in detached houses per year compared to smaller companies. Also, a correlation between the supply of cheap fuel in the production mix and the expansion rate has been found, although the correlation is rather weak. Many companies use sales processes that are similar to each other. The first step in the sales process is to investigate the customer interest for district heating within the area. This is accomplished either by sending out interest inquiries to the potential customers and arranging information meetings, or by assigning an already interested customer to investigate the interest for district heating in the neighbourhood. A combination of the different activities also exists. The next step is contract signing. The customer is usually tied up by the contract to connect to district heating when the system is expanded to the area, whereas the company does not guarantee any connection unless a sufficient rate of connections can be achieved in the area. Several companies also perform sales to latecomers during or after the erection of the system.The figure above discloses results from the study regarding which information companies have or collect about their potential customers. The information mainly concerns physical factors that can be used for estimating heat load in an area, factors that can be used to determine the heat sources presently used by the customer and the age of boilers and equipment in the houses. Some companies have been rather active when it comes to physical factors and for instance used the public record of energy wells in order to get an indication of the existence of heat pumps in the area. This is one example of an interesting move that other companies surely can adopt. Social factors like income, profession, education and age of household members are hardly examined at all. This kind of information is needed by the district heating companies for them to be able to offer customer specific solutions or to sharpen the argumentation when marketing district heating. From this viewpoint the customer is still seen merely a heat load in the district heating system. When the company presents their offer to connect houses to the grid the customers are not always in the situation where they can change heat source right away. The district heating companies have developed a variety of strategies to deal with this problem. Some companies offer compensation to the customer for the old heat source or assist in mediating the customer’s old boiler to a buyer. If the customers’ heating device breaks down before the house has been connected to the district heating system, some companies arrange a temporary solution for the customer. A small number of companies offer a resting connection if the customer for some reason doesn’t want to connect to the district heating system straight away. Only very few companies offer services that stand out from the core business ”to sell heat to detached houses”.

District heating is well expanded in the residential areas in Sweden, although not in detached house areas. Increased environmental concerns as well as steadily increasing electricity and oil prices make the detached houses sector a potential market for the district heating companies. District heating in low heat density areas is economically challenging for mainly two reasons: Firstly, construction of the district heating system implicate large investment costs. Secondly, the distributions costs, particularly for heat losses, will be larger in systems with low heat density. In order to maximize the line heat density and to reduce the investment cost per house a high rate of connections in the area is essential. Hence the economic prerequisites bring about a market situation in which the district heating companies are required to connect as many customers as possible within a specific area at the same time. The aim of this study is to find out what kind of strategies the district heating companies use for selling district heating to detached house owners. Our hope is that this study will help transferring knowledge and experiences between the district heating companies; that is identify efforts for new, successful strategies and to make some specific contributions to these new strategies. Methods used in this study were a survey that was sent to all of the members of The Swedish District Heating Association and telephone interviews with some of the companies that answered the survey. The rate of answers in the survey was 30 % and the number of interviews was 17. Results from the statistical analysis show that the size of a company is an important factor for the expansions rate. As measurements of company size either the company’s amount of customers, or the company’s total amount of heat sold per year, have been used. Not very surprising, large companies seem to connect a higher number of new customers in detached houses per year compared to smaller companies. Also, a correlation between the supply of cheap fuel in the production mix and the expansion rate has been found, although the correlation is rather weak. Many companies use sales processes that are similar to each other. The first step in the sales process is to investigate the customer interest for district heating within the area. This is accomplished either by sending out interest inquiries to the potential customers and arranging information meetings, or by assigning an already interested customer to investigate the interest for district heating in the neighbourhood. A combination of the different activities also exists. The next step is contract signing. The customer is usually tied up by the contract to connect to district heating when the system is expanded to the area, whereas the company does not guarantee any connection unless a sufficient rate of connections can be achieved in the area. Several companies also perform sales to latecomers during or after the erection of the system.The figure above discloses results from the study regarding which information companies have or collect about their potential customers. The information mainly concerns physical factors that can be used for estimating heat load in an area, factors that can be used to determine the heat sources presently used by the customer and the age of boilers and equipment in the houses. Some companies have been rather active when it comes to physical factors and for instance used the public record of energy wells in order to get an indication of the existence of heat pumps in the area. This is one example of an interesting move that other companies surely can adopt. Social factors like income, profession, education and age of household members are hardly examined at all. This kind of information is needed by the district heating companies for them to be able to offer customer specific solutions or to sharpen the argumentation when marketing district heating. From this viewpoint the customer is still seen merely a heat load in the district heating system. When the company presents their offer to connect houses to the grid the customers are not always in the situation where they can change heat source right away. The district heating companies have developed a variety of strategies to deal with this problem. Some companies offer compensation to the customer for the old heat source or assist in mediating the customer’s old boiler to a buyer. If the customers’ heating device breaks down before the house has been connected to the district heating system, some companies arrange a temporary solution for the customer. A small number of companies offer a resting connection if the customer for some reason doesn’t want to connect to the district heating system straight away. Only very few companies offer services that stand out from the core business ”to sell heat to detached houses”.

Sustainable development and responsible entrepreneurship have attracted increasing attention in the recent decades, especially after the financial crisis in 2008, which was caused by mismanagement and irresponsible business practice by the banking and financial industry. As a result of this the industry’s credibility has diminished which has resulted in a higher demand for sustainability and transparency from the banks as they are strongly linked to the financial stability. The study aims to create a deeper understanding of Sweden's four largest banks sustainability reports, focusing on how the banks work with sustainability in relation to what society demands. The focal point will be on the banks' sustainability reports between the years of 2014-2018. The study has adopted a qualitative research strategy to decode the data a content analysis has been used. It has also been based on an abductive research design where theory and the collected data has formed the basis for the conclusion. Based on the coding scheme that was developed together with the bank’s own classification of their own sustainability development and Schwartz and Carroll’s (2003) three-domain model of CSR, data was collected from the bank’s sustainability report. This was then analysed together with the help of legitimacy theory, institutional theory and the critic directed towards the sustainability report. The study results indicate that the bank’s presentation of their sustainability report shaped of external expectations and pressure, under a time of diminished trust for the bank and finance sector. Furthermore, the sustainability report’s effect on the bank’s legitimacy is estimated to be low and the conflicts brought forward by the bank’s is due to the bank’s trying to satisfy many different needs. Hållbar utveckling och ansvarsfullt företagande har under de senaste decennierna uppmärksammats allt mer, inte minst efter finanskrisen 2008, vilket orsakades av bank och finanssektorns ansvarslösa uppförande. Till följd av detta har förtroendet av sektorn minskat vilket resulterat i en allt större efterfrågan på hållbarhet och transparens av fältets aktörer då bankerna är starkt kopplade till den finansiella stabiliteten. Studien avser att skapa en djupare förståelse för Sveriges fyra största bankers hållbarhetsredovisning med fokus på hur bankerna arbetar med hållbarhet i relation till samhällets efterfrågan. Som utgångspunkt används bankernas hållbarhetsrapporter mellan åren 2014–2018. Studien har antagit en kvalitativ forskningsstrategi som präglats av en innehållsanalys vid datainsamlingen. Vidare har studien utgått ifrån en abduktiv forskningsdesign där teori och empiri i växelverkan justerats för att besvara syftet på ett lämpligt sätt. Utifrån kodningsschemat som utvecklades tillsammans med bankernas egna rubricering av sitt hållbarhetsarbete och Schwartz och Carrolls (2003) tre domänmodell, samlades data in från bankernas hållbarhetsredovisning. Detta analyserades sedan med hjälp av legitimitetsteorin, institutionell teori och den kritik som riktats mot hållbarhetsredovisning. Studiens resultat pekar mot att bankernas presentation av sitt hållbarhetsarbete formats av externa förväntningar och påtryckningar, under en tid av minskat förtroende för hela bank- och finanssektorn. Vidare har hållbarhetsredovisningens inverkan på bankernas legitimitet uppskattats vara låg samt att motstridigheter av bankernas kommunikation beror på att bankerna försöker tillfredsställa många olika behov.

Sustainable development and responsible entrepreneurship have attracted increasing attention in the recent decades, especially after the financial crisis in 2008, which was caused by mismanagement and irresponsible business practice by the banking and financial industry. As a result of this the industry’s credibility has diminished which has resulted in a higher demand for sustainability and transparency from the banks as they are strongly linked to the financial stability. The study aims to create a deeper understanding of Sweden's four largest banks sustainability reports, focusing on how the banks work with sustainability in relation to what society demands. The focal point will be on the banks' sustainability reports between the years of 2014-2018. The study has adopted a qualitative research strategy to decode the data a content analysis has been used. It has also been based on an abductive research design where theory and the collected data has formed the basis for the conclusion. Based on the coding scheme that was developed together with the bank’s own classification of their own sustainability development and Schwartz and Carroll’s (2003) three-domain model of CSR, data was collected from the bank’s sustainability report. This was then analysed together with the help of legitimacy theory, institutional theory and the critic directed towards the sustainability report. The study results indicate that the bank’s presentation of their sustainability report shaped of external expectations and pressure, under a time of diminished trust for the bank and finance sector. Furthermore, the sustainability report’s effect on the bank’s legitimacy is estimated to be low and the conflicts brought forward by the bank’s is due to the bank’s trying to satisfy many different needs. Hållbar utveckling och ansvarsfullt företagande har under de senaste decennierna uppmärksammats allt mer, inte minst efter finanskrisen 2008, vilket orsakades av bank och finanssektorns ansvarslösa uppförande. Till följd av detta har förtroendet av sektorn minskat vilket resulterat i en allt större efterfrågan på hållbarhet och transparens av fältets aktörer då bankerna är starkt kopplade till den finansiella stabiliteten. Studien avser att skapa en djupare förståelse för Sveriges fyra största bankers hållbarhetsredovisning med fokus på hur bankerna arbetar med hållbarhet i relation till samhällets efterfrågan. Som utgångspunkt används bankernas hållbarhetsrapporter mellan åren 2014–2018. Studien har antagit en kvalitativ forskningsstrategi som präglats av en innehållsanalys vid datainsamlingen. Vidare har studien utgått ifrån en abduktiv forskningsdesign där teori och empiri i växelverkan justerats för att besvara syftet på ett lämpligt sätt. Utifrån kodningsschemat som utvecklades tillsammans med bankernas egna rubricering av sitt hållbarhetsarbete och Schwartz och Carrolls (2003) tre domänmodell, samlades data in från bankernas hållbarhetsredovisning. Detta analyserades sedan med hjälp av legitimitetsteorin, institutionell teori och den kritik som riktats mot hållbarhetsredovisning. Studiens resultat pekar mot att bankernas presentation av sitt hållbarhetsarbete formats av externa förväntningar och påtryckningar, under en tid av minskat förtroende för hela bank- och finanssektorn. Vidare har hållbarhetsredovisningens inverkan på bankernas legitimitet uppskattats vara låg samt att motstridigheter av bankernas kommunikation beror på att bankerna försöker tillfredsställa många olika behov.