Jamie Beaton is the 20-year-old CEO of Crimson Consulting, which he co-founded in his teens. He is also studying for bachelor and master maths degrees at Harvard.
Tell me about Crimson Consulting.
We put support people around learners to help them succeed in future careers as well as in university and school. There are a lot of biases related to where you're from - sometimes in good ways, sometimes bad. We want students to be directed, supported and mentored regardless of where in the world they are born.
Did you always know you were going to go do this?
When I was a student at King's College people wanted to push me into medicine, engineering or law. It was just luck I realised I could apply to overseas schools. One reason I'm so passionate about this business is if I had listened to everyone around me I probably wouldn't have got into the US and UK universities I applied to. Now I've seen the wild world of technology, entrepreneurship and finance and have been around a lot of people on very different career trajectories than you might think of coming from New Zealand. There's such a big focus on entrepreneurship here - Mark Zuckerberg was in the house next to mine - and Harvard seemed a natural fit. I've had this amazing ecosystem here to mentor and support me. I probably wouldn't have started the business if I hadn't been exposed to that.
