By: In many ways, these are the good old days again. Most IT executives are focused on growth and customer acquisition, instead of cost reduction. Freshly minted Internet billionaires once again roam the earth, and strategists such as Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail, are revealing new ways to profit from the Web. Yet the main goal for enterprise IT isn't strategic innovation - but business process improvement. Why? In part it's because process improvement serves many masters. How else could you increase revenue, reduce costs and improve productivity, all at the same time? And investments in IT architecture and infrastructure make these results possible, sometimes immediately. But there are signs that IT's role in strategy is still too limited. It doesn't help that companies continue to struggle to make information useful and deliver quality service. For now, the pursuit of better execution appears more important than finding new ways to profit from IT. In this slideshow: 1. Process improvement will be job No. 1 2. IT works on closing the sale 3. Companies make their Web sites more engaging 4. Customer service gets a tune-up 5. Companies put their mounds of data to work 6. Information governance gains momentum 7. CIOs strive to be strategic
