I understand why xp_cmdshell would would be disabled in a non-dedicated environment hosted by a 3rd party. In that case there is a clear distinction between the database owner and the sysadmin.

I personally use xm_cmdshell to do things like get free disk space, copy files, manage windows accounts, etc. That comes in handy when I don't have Remote Console access to the server. This is in the development and QA environment though. I'm not a production DBA in my current job.