The notion of a "chief procurement officer" isn't new. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has had one since 1998, and the title can be found in any number of other government agencies and branches of the military. Private companies have embraced it as well, although the position hasn't enjoyed a solid footing in most C-suites for more than a decade or so. Maybe it was the success of companies like Apple, with its mastery of supply management, that convinced top executives of the need to elevate procurement to the highest levels of the organization.

It's fairly common practice today for major brands to have a social media team at the ready to respond to customer complaints on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook. The practice is so widespread that a recent Call Center Satisfaction Index (CCSI) report released by CFI Group found that call centers should perhaps be renamed "contact centers."

When economic hard times hit in 2007-2008, CFOs and finance departments felt pressure to improve their organizations' working capital positions. The longer companies could hold on to cash, the more liquid they were, and the safer they felt. Paying bills quickly meant dipping into cash reserves, possibly taking away money from new-product development, mergers and acquisitions, marketing, or anything else that might drive top-line revenue. It was either that or be forced to rely for growth on expensive external financing. Everyone knew that when it came to days payable outstanding, longer was better.

Do you have powerful IT systems monitoring every movement in your supply chain? Collecting thousands of pieces of data from origin to destination? Building up a comprehensive data bank over months and years of business intelligence? So what do you do with that data?

For 2013, the new "borderless" business environment will present the greatest opportunities to companies in IT, finance, HR and other business services areas, as companies strive to reduce costs and meet aggressive revenue projections, according to a new Enterprise Key Issues Study from The Hackett Group Inc.