The characteristics and dynamics of management controls in IJVs: Evidence from a Sino-Japanese case

•Focuses on the post-formation stage of a Chinese–Japanese automotive joint venture.•In-depth observation on the interrelationships and dynamics of control dimensions.•A shared but split control style is identified.•Balance between maintaining structural stability and allowing evolutionary change.

This paper examines the characteristics and dynamics of management controls in international joint ventures (IJVs) from multiple-dimensional perspectives. Adopting an in-depth case study method in the instance of a large automotive IJV formed between two Chinese and Japanese partners, the study seeks to improve on existing models by accounting for the three dimensions of management controls: mechanism, focus, and extent, and examining their interrelationships and dynamics. It offers the first observation on how, at the post-formation stage, parents may adjust the extent of control over specific activities or the tightness of a control mechanism to reflect environmental changes without unsettling their overall control structure; thus, a balance between stability and change is achieved. A shared but split control style is identified, supplementing previous descriptions of management style in IJVs, within which two partners share control access over the entire range of activities with broad control focus, but each possesses tight control only over certain specific activities.