To Mads Kajer, the principle owner of Kjaer A/S, a company's economic success mainly depends on the quality of its employees; on their professionalism, their flexibility, their cooperation - and especially on their motivation. So, in order to motivate his employees at company headquarters in Denmark, Mads Kjaer launched several activities such as a joint daily coffee break or the so-called "Life-Club" - an employee-run platform that organised parties as well as sport and leisure time activities.

The Life Club in Svendborg, at company headquarters, was highly popular with employees and Mads Kjaer saw it was a great way to boost employee motivation, increase satisfaction and lower staff turnover. This, in turn, enabled Kjaer A/S to invest more in its employees and led to greater efficiency.

For these reasons, Kjaer wanted to introduce Life-Clubs in the company's major subsidiaries in developing countries in 2004. But a few questions arose: Should - and could - the original Life Club be copied one-to-one? How would it meet the local employees' and communities' special life and circumstantial needs?

As Kjaer A/S had just discovered a fraud scheme in Uganda in 2004 it was also especially important to understand whether the Life-Clubs could become a integral tool within the company's human resource management.

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