Since the last economic recession public organisations, especially in infrastructure and security sectors, face a number of strategic challenges regarding the maintenance of their unique and complex technical system (Bobbink and Hartmann, 2014; Hartley, 2008; Humphries and Wilding, 2004; Koppenjan, 2005; Levering et al., 2013; Tatham, 2013). Public asset owners have been under pressure to reduce the downtime and life-cycle costs of their systems in an attempt to improve business cost efficiency and dependability (Brax and Jonsson, 2008; Samaddar et al., 2006). Their operational technical systems have become increasingly unique and complex, making it infeasible to develop and sustain all relevant maintenance knowledge at in-house servicedepartments (Pateli, 2009). Moreover, due to the ageing of the technical workforce, irrespective of their nature, service maintenance providers are forced to group technological expertise to enhance their utilisation and the development of new knowledge (Cambra-Fierro et al., 2011). To improve public services in quality and effectiveness and to make operations more efficient, Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) have emerged as a strategic instrument in the Dutch maritime industry; they are pursued by public and commercial service providers teaming up and pooling complementary knowledge, skills, and resources over a longer period of time. This way, they seek to co-perform and secure the service maintenance on both the public and commercial systems (Chang et al., 2008; Kleemann and Essig, 2013). When controlled effectively, such PublicPrivate Service Maintenance Partnerships (PPSMPs) can increase the utilisation of resources, lower cost, and enhance innovation (Samaddar et al., 2006; Schemm and Legner, 2008). Exercising the required control across private and public actors, however, proves to be a daunting task. Researchers studying inter-organisational value creation and performance management have repeatedly reported these control challenges (Crié and Micheaux, 2006; Otto et al., 2011), referring to organisations’ ongoing struggle to manage diverse partnership risks (Majchrzak et al., 2015; Pitsis et al., 2004) and the myriad of governance inadequacies (Bamford et al., 2003). Sampson and Williamson – as cited in (Vlaar et al., 2006) – found that partners’ (in)ability to control partnership performance appears to depend on (in)adequate informal or formal control mechanisms (Sampson, 2004; Williamson, 1985). These findings echo related work on partnership governance (Feller et al., 2013; Keers and van Fenema, 2015; Mukherjee et al., 2013; Smith et al., 1995; Tjemkes et al., 2012). Different control approaches have been advocated emanating from a variety of perspectives, economics, organisation science, or sociology (Dunford and Jones, 2000; Wilkinson et al., 2013), contributing to the much-debated question of whether formal and informal control mechanisms substitute or complement each other (Ansari et al., 2014). Research mainly explored the selection and effects of various mechanisms, instead of deepening insight into organisations’ capability to sufficiently manage PPP project risks in practice (Elmuti and Kathawala, 2001).