Cynthia Williams – President, Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming

Cynthia Williams is President of Wizards of the Coast and Digital
Gaming at Hasbro. In this role, Cynthia leads the strategy for
two of the biggest names in gaming, MAGIC: THE GATHERING and
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, while driving continued global growth for
the division and leading new fan and story-led tabletop and
digital experiences. She is focused on building and expanding on
the outstanding foundation laid by Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks, under
whose leadership Wizards of the Coast doubled its revenue from
2018 to 2021.


Cynthia has a deep understanding of technology and e-commerce,
along with cloud and console-based gaming, with expertise in
scaling businesses to drive profitable growth. She previously
served as General Manager and Vice President, Gaming Ecosystem
Commercial Team at Microsoft, notably driving the expansion of
Xbox Gaming and the acceleration of game-creator growth. Prior to
joining Microsoft, Cynthia spent more than a decade at Amazon,
where she led the global growth of their e-commerce
direct-to-consumer business, Fulfillment by Amazon.


She serves as an advisor to Mana Up Hawaii, a product incubator
focused on empowering Hawaiian entrepreneurs to scale globally.
Cynthia graduated from Western Carolina University with a B.S. in
Business Administration, Summa Cum Laude and received her MBA
with Distinction from Wake Forest University.


Listen till 14:39 to hear Cynthia talk about the importance of
play and why women should give gaming a try!


“I would encourage women to give gaming a try if they haven’t in
the past. Perhaps you thought, when I was growing up my first
experience with DUNGEONS & DRAGONS was with a group of guys I
knew and they were playing and I asked if I could play and they
were like no this isn’t for girls. Well now more than fifty
percent of the people who play DUNGEONS & DRAGONS are women
and so I would encourage women who maybe thought they weren’t
invited to the party to give it a try because it is a terrific
way to connect with people, to relieve some stress and to have
fun. Play is a human need, it’s not just for children and so I
would encourage the women listening to your podcast to spend more
time in their life playing.”  


Check out the book! - Fearless: Girls with Dreams, Women
with Vision


The Fearless Women Podcast


fearlesswomenpodcast@gmail.com


The Beacon Agency


Sponsors:


BDC


Lockheed Martin


Export Development Canada