Effective Combinations of Control Strategies in Inter-Organizational Projects

Effective control is crucial to enhance project performance. Accordingly, organizations implement various control strategies to manage projects, e.g., formal, social, bureaucratic, and clan control. Control is a particular challenge in interorganizational projects (IOPs) due to the coexistence of intra- and interorganizational control strategies. Whereas previous literature discussed control strategies of each organization (e.g., owner and delivery organizations) separately, this article argues that managers of IOPs should align intra- and interorganizational control strategies. To identify effective control strategies in IOPs, this article analyzes how six control strategies combinations (implemented by the project owner and delivery organizations) influence IOP performance. Based on survey data from 360 Architectural and Engineering (A/E) design practitioners in China, results suggest that effective combinations of control strategies in IOPs are context-dependent: 1) when project owner organizations implement interorganizational formal control strategies, their delivery organizations should implement intraorganizational bureaucratic and clan control strategies; 2) when project owner organizations implement interorganizational social control strategies, their delivery organizations should implement intraorganizational clan control strategies. This article expands agency theory and the project governance literature by matching effective combinations of control strategies to enhance the governance of IOPs.