I might be from another planet, but the level of satisfaction experienced by our US customers is very high, and I cannot believe we are the only provider in this situation (it would be too sweet!).

A few hints though:

- We do not bother with CMM, ISO, etc. in our US contracts (although our corporate owns the proper certifications)

- We sign balanced contracts. We commit and we ask our customers to commit

- Although we are well established, we focus on projects that are challenging for us, since we believe there are the ones with the highest chance of success for us. We might just skip a project that is either too big or not challenging enough for our company

- We only assign experienced people to projects, and we do not move people around.

And we do advanced stuff for our customers, not only maintenance or QA. By advanced stuff, I mean contributing to their innovation.

It works for us; it has to work for others.

I too am surprised by the dissatisfaction over “innovation brought by their provider” I must admit that I haven’t yet read the Forrester report, so it will not be fair for me to speculate over the reasons for lack of innovation brought in by the provider. A few of my observations for such lack of innovativeness include:
* Challenge of NIH [Not-Invented-Here] where internal teams are loath to accept ‘innovative’ suggestions from their vendors. [fixing this requires a delicate balance]
* Vendor staff not skilled in the domain/sub-domain [this is an easier problem to fix if identified early in the relationship]
* Defining expectations from the engagement [not all engagements require ‘innovation’ but the expectation could be that the vendor will automatically bring in innovation in every task]

To all who say they are surprised:

The words "defining expectations" are referred to so casually like it is merely a checkbox prior to deal signing. This is the heart of the ongoing problem. As time passes, and people change, it is almost IMPOSSIBLE to keep up with, and both sides are to blame.

We all know that the half life for key players is about 18 months, so by year three, a new cast of characters (on both sides) is fully entrenched with new priorities and management above them. Everyone in the chain now has disconnected expectations, and the new players on the client side will always say "Why hasn't there been innovation over the last three years prior to my arrival" (or said differently... "What have you done for me lately?")

Again, I am surprised that you are surprised by this, although I am in perfect agreement: Managing expectations is paramount. Both sides evolving to meet those ever changing expectations (within limits) is the hard part.