A V.P. of Engineering is a Technical Executive within an organization. Often times this person will report into a Chief Technology Officer (CTO) with one or more Directors of Engineering reporting to them. A V.P. of Engineering is defined by their impact on the team, the product, the process, and the organization more broadly. For the team, they should be focused on growing (recruiting) and developing (training and career advancement)1. The VPE may need to set process and culture, or at least formalize it depending on the maturity of the company. If nothing else, they should be making sure the culture is maintained and iteratively improved. On the product side, they may engage with architecting solutions and assuredly they should be involved in roadmap planning. Finally, the VP of Engineering impacts the organization in subtle ways. This can be engaging in the sales process, evangelizing tech and product within the organization and outside.
Karim Fanous describes the VP of engineering role this way1:
The role of the VP of Engineering is to build and maintain the system that develops the products and services a business requires