A chief procurement officer (CPO) undertakes an executive role within an enterprise, focusing on sourcing, procurement, and supply management.

Typically, a CPO is responsible for the management, administration, and supervision of the company's acquisition programs. They may be in charge of the contracting services and may manage the purchase of supplies, equipment, and materials. It is often his or her responsibility to source goods and services and to negotiate prices and contracts. Many CPOs report to a director or directly to the chief executive officer (CEO) of their company. In some organisations the role is named chief acquisition officer, e.g. in the United States Department of Agriculture.

A chief procurement officer and their department will often be responsible for:

Some CPOs are in charge of locating sources for supplies and services, and maintaining relations with suppliers and vendors. They usually negotiate with vendors to get the best prices and deals, utilizing the power of purchase and the economies of scale. Often they set up contracts between vendors and the company.

Aside from sourcing and negotiating prices and contracts, the CPO's staff usually work with a business's accounts payable function to ensure that vendors are paid on schedule. In addition, they usually keep inventory levels current and take responsibility for forecasting the future supply needs of the company.

Many industries employ procurement officers, from small companies to global organizations. In a small company, the procurement officer may work singly, but often there is a team that executes the purchasing for an organization. A chief procurement officer working for a multinational corporation might manage a globally-dispersed team.

Whether at a small company or a large one, the chief procurement officer usually provides overall leadership to the purchasing team and ensures that procurement policies and procedures are followed. Typically, they also are constantly in search of better quality products and better prices. In a lot of companies, all procurement decisions ultimately end up at the desk of the CPO.

The position of the chief procurement officer is believed by many to have taken on increased significance in corporations, and the role is thought to have grown more strategic in recent years. Globalization, compliance pressures, supply market risk, and procurement automation have simultaneously elevated the visibility of the procurement discipline within companies and increased supply management challenges. In response, procurement executives have established agendas for organizational transformation. These plans incorporate activities to bring more spending under management, enhance the procurement organization's skills and visibility, and increase both internal and external collaboration. Such pressures have also triggered a trend toward centralization of the procurement function for the purposes of standardization and leverage. Willem Uijen, CPO of Unilever, describes the procurement organization which he leads as "purpose-led, value-driven and future-fit organisation", Marco Gonçalves, CPO of Nestlé, has emphasised the role which procurement plays in making his company a "sustainable business".