As a software engineer, how can I build my career to eventually become an executive at a large technology company?

1- Do what you love and what what you are good at. Only then you'll always be in the right place AND You'll end up in the right place. 2- Keep learning new things everyday. Specially if you want to be a VP, director, etc., you'll need to work on your business skills. Many software engineers lack the business knowledge and expertise required to be an executive. 3- Work on your people skills. If you can't effectively work with people, you won't be able to manage them.

Referring to one answer here I don't think that the question deserves so much of criticism. I believe that the OP's aspirations are legit for the following reasons. 1. Not everyone are Entrepreneurial. Being an Entrepreneur involves a certain level of risk, not everyone would want to take that path. 2. Starting one's own company is just one way of changing the world. There are a lot of executives who have had a great impact both in terms. Sure one can google that. For starters you can look at http://hbr.org/2013/01/the-best-performing-ceos-in-the-world a lot of them did not start their own company and yet they are successful. 3. Working for someone else's vision: This can also be equally challenging and not below one's dignity. And now sharing what little I have known. 1. Have Local Impact: Start with your own team, work really hard become an indispensable asset to your own team. Seek opportunities that go beyond your responsibilities. Eg: If you are with the dev teams go talk to a manager from the customer service org and ask how you can share knowledge and collaborate with their engineers on understanding the customer reported defects. Surprisingly in large companies with huge structures, a lot of this valuable information gets dissipated. 2. Take on Leadership Roles: Start with mentoring new hires within your team, helping them ramp up quickly. Then slowly try to increase your circle of influence to other teams by positive collaboration. 3. Network, Network and Network: Volunteer for organization wide events, be it CSR initiatives, Tech Talks or Conferences. Start by going there as a participant. Talk to senior people on how they got there and what kind of career road-map you need to build. 4. Find a Mentor: This would be harder than it sounds. Find someone who knows your work perhaps two or three levels up in the hierarchy and work with developing good professional relationships. 5. Think about your credentials: This does matter, For eg: Seek out advanced degrees from reputed institutions. More than brand value of a degree from such universities, you will get to talk to and work with some of the best names. The things that you can learn from them are limitless. More importantly have lots of patience. The fact that have a drive to have a bigger impact says a lot about you. Work sincerely, make some really good friends  and care for people who matter to you. Because some day when you look out from your posh office you need to realize that all these efforts was worth it and you have people to share your success with. Best -AB

Out of xx,xxx employees, the VP of engineering positions represent like 0.01%. So your question translates into "how can I build my career to be in the top 0.01%?". You may be smart, technically good, business savvy, well connected, honest or shrewd and still not make it. There's many others with the same qualities. I would say this is about sensing and seizing opportunities. I would also be willing to bet that those that are in the 0.01% weren't asking this question when they were 22.

I highly recommend Marc J. Schiller's 11 Secrets of Highly Influential IT Leaders. It opened my eyes to a whole new way of approaching a tech, or any other, career. In particular, his guidance on "earning your seat at the table" was a real eye-opener for me.

I agree with , however that being said: Decomposition: Take your large scale goal and decompose it Roadmap: Since this goal has people who have completed it, interview them. If you can’t interview them, see if you can find out their position history and path and try to learn from it. General Conduct: Consider ‘s advice, it’s pretty solid Scope: Every position you obtain, learn to ask yourself “what is missing” that your customer (the company or service or product - these are all the things you are serving as an employee). Expand your scope to cover as much of what you envision as possible. This is how to begin producing vision. Vision: As you define vision, you will need to convince others to adopt your vision and be comfortable with them making it both your own and their own. You want to demonstrate iterative, small successes to prove out your vision and continue accelerating it. You will need to give a lot of credit and be considerate and thankful to those who help you make it happen. Soft Skills & Risk Management: Soft skills are as important as technical skills, and if you are on the right path, you’ll end up doing less implementation and using technical knowledge more for vision and direction. You need to learn to transition to look at the level of detail that concerns you, only focusing down on the highest risks. Every edge: Use networking and opportunity to your advantage. Take on things others don’t want to take on that you know you can and make yourself known for excellence. Beyond that, every culture is different, so you need to be patient and jump on the right chances.

Are you really 22? Truly, youth is wasted on the young... Do yourself a favor and stop trying to predict what your 42 y.o. self will find enjoyable and interesting to do. As long as you don't completely fuck it up for him, he'll be fine. He'll take care of himself better than you can, trust me. In the meantime, enjoy being 22. Your question tells me that you are not nearly as good at it as you should be. Work on that.