#311: Mark Pincus, Founder & Former CEO, Zynga – Trust your instincts, but vet your ideas

David Novak (0:00)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of How Leaders Lead with David Novak. Today's guest is Mark Pincus, the founder and former CEO of Zynga.

Now, in 2007, Mark had a gut feeling that adults would play games on their phones if they were just woven into their daily lives. On that instinct, he founded Zynga and built the biggest games of the early Internet, including FarmVille, Words With Friends, and Zynga Poker. Four years later, they had over a billion users. So it's safe to say that Mark's instincts were right. In this conversation, you'll learn exactly how Mark got there and all the lessons and mistakes he's learned from along the way.

Enjoy this conversation with David and Mark, and I will see you at the end of the episode for the debrief.

David Novak (0:49)

You've spent a great deal of your career making games played by hundreds of millions of people, but I understand that the only game you really play these days is chess. Why is that?

Mark Pincus (1:02)

One thing I try to do is just never, I never want to force myself to use an app or play a game. I don't want this to feel like work. I want it to always feel like play.

And so I just have what I've noticed over the years, and this is a core instinct that I really proved out in building Zynga, is that as adults, we have a tough time giving ourselves permission to play. And one of the things we need is to feel like we're using our time well. And so part of the formula, the secret sauce that I think made Zynga games work for so many adults, was that it related to your real life. And so the nice thing about playing chess online is that it translates, it's not all just gone with that one game. You can build a life skill that translates to beating or being more competitive with your friends, or in my case, my daughter, and even lessons that are useful in your real life. And a lot, the majority of video games don't offer you any value in your real life and they're empty calories. So that's why I'm only playing chess.com or Leigh Chess.

David Novak (2:17)

That's great. And you mentioned the secret sauce. I also understand that you're obsessed with making the perfect bolognese. I mean, how close do you get to perfect?

Mark Pincus (2:28)

You never get to perfect, not really. And then if you do, that's all embodied in that one sauce. And you'll never make that exact sauce again. But I'm getting pretty good.

I went in to Flour and Water, to their test prep kitchen here in San Francisco, to work with their head chef thinking it was going to be in the book. And I didn't want to be a fraud talking about bolognese without ever talking to a serious chef and they made theirs their way, which was really good. And then I collaborated with them to make mine. And I have to say that they really liked mine. And I may have even convinced them to take Carrots out, which is a big win in the bolognese world.

David Novak (3:17)

That's awesome, you know. And getting now to your business leadership, you started Zynga in 2007

Where did you come up with that name? It's a unique name.

Mark Pincus (3:31)

You know, this is just the random way that life works. And it gets to my philosophy on naming, that that was just the name of my dog, and I was desperate. I mean, we couldn't come up with a name that we like to save our lives.

And I had this dog, this amazing rock star dog, Zynga, that had been with me at that point for 10 years, 11 years.

And her name was originally N. Zynga, and she was a rescue, and it was too many syllables, so I cut it to Zynga. I tried for years to buy zynga.com, but it's owned by William Zynga, Zynga Industries in Wisconsin. I think they literally make ball bearings. I could not get it. And so one of my engineers came up with the idea to just misspell her name instead of Z-I-N-G-A, Z-Y-N-G-A. And I thought that was just a terrible idea. I was like, no one's ever going to be able to pronounce this. But he said, but the domain is available and we can get the trademark. And I was like, I hate this. Fine. I'm sick of the name thing. Let's just do it. And true enough, people were afraid to say the name. We would go to regular people and say, read this, and they'd say, nope. And they'd say, Zynga, Zynga.