September 28, 2019 - Continuing our look at successful returnee stories and experiences from the Croatian diaspora to the homeland, next up Daniel Nikic from Cohres on his journey from Canada to Zagreb.
- Born in Canada, returned to Croatia, something that many diaspora dream of doing. Tell us briefly about your journey.
I was born to Croatian parents from Bosnia and Herzegovina, more specifically from small villages of Ruzici and Tihaljina in the town of Grude. My parents moved to Canada in their early 20s in the late 1960s via Stuttgart, Germany. I grew up in a small town called Halton Hills (45-min drive from Toronto) and had a great childhood. After university, I was not really ambitious in terms of my career and quite frankly I wanted to be like Leonardo DiCaprio in the movie, The Beach. As a kid I would visit Bosnia and Herzegovina in the summers and established good quality relationships with locals, therefore I had some knowledge of Croatia, although vacationing is very different from living (especially for diaspora / ex-pats). I was fortunate to have an uncle who lives in Zagreb and he would always push my cousins and others in Canada to move back to Croatia. Once I finished university in 2009, I spent the summer in Bosnia and Herzegovina enjoying the last days of my youth and moved to Zagreb in September 2009. I worked for my uncle's company for a year and then proceeded to work for a Slovakian real estate development company, which later led me to become an entrepreneur and open my own company, Cohres in 2014. Cohres initially started off as an outsource consulting firm for finance and market research and then restructured in 2017 to focus on investment research.
- Looking back, what were your hopes, expectations and fears about moving to Croatia?
The first year in Croatia started off with the mentality to take advantage of being in Croatia, and to not say “what-if” as I did not expect to stay in Croatia for a long time. I quite frankly had a plan to stay one year at most. I did not share my expectations with anyone because I myself was not sure what to expect. I have to admit I missed Canada quite a lot since I felt more Canadian than ever once I started living in Zagreb. In the beginning, I felt a real social-cultural difference between Canada and Croatia, which is logical in some ways, but I was a 21-year old who was quite impulsive to say the least. Overall, my expectation was that it would be easy in Croatia, since I thought economic barriers are not that important, which in some ways is true, however should not be the main and only factor when deciding to move somewhere. I must admit that my fear of moving to Croatia was leaving behind good friends and family back home in Canada and moving on with my own life, similar to what many had to do when leaving Europe to move to North America, Australia and South America. I hoped that Croatia would be a hidden gem and I would become a rock star quickly and gain quick success, well I was wrong about that. It took a lot of patience and persistence to get to where I am today. One thing that I have always felt, and still feel, is that Zagreb has a spirit and it is a city that offers much to do and experience. This is a feeling that has not changed since I first arrived and even now.
- How supportive was your Croatian community back home at the time?
In terms of back home, I have to admit some people in my life were positive and some were negative when I announced that I would be moving to Croatia. I must be honest, if I did not meet my now wife after my year in Zagreb, I would have most likely moved back, as I told myself I would only stay a year. As the expression goes “you never know what to expect in life.” Those who were negative shared with me that they had bad experiences in Croatia, were afraid of change or were stubborn in their thoughts that there is no potential in Croatia and/or Bosnia and Herzegovina. Those who were supportive stated many times that due to globalization, Croatia should prosper and improve in terms of quality of life. I am glad I pushed myself to stay a minimum of one year in Croatia. All in all, I think many diaspora make their decisions of living in Croatia based on their own expectations and experiences.
- What were the main differences in what you expected to find in Croatia and the reality of living in Croatia?
Personally, I expected Croatia to be very easy-going and that I would not have to work too much to be able to make a comfortable living, which is not true and it is not true for wherever one decides to live. I also felt that Croatia was behind in many factors such as education and work environment, but I must admit, for a small market, Croatia is quite advanced despite bureaucracy issues, just look at how many entrepreneurs there are compared to other countries. Also, I did not realize the lack of adoption to technology in terms of bureaucracy in Croatia, which I believe is a major turn off to many when deciding to live in Croatia. One thing I greatly admire about Croatia is that not everything is commercialized in other words there is an originality that is sometimes hard to find elsewhere.
- Many diaspora think of returning but few do. In truth, there is little information out there about real-life stories and help/info about the process. What advice do you have for those who are thinking about making the move?
I think despite what many think about diaspora, moving to Croatia is difficult. If someone is born and raised for example in Canada even if their parents could be from Lika, Dalmatia, or Zagorje they are still Canadian and will most likely to some extent have Canadian values in terms of social and cultural values. There is definitely little information and help/info on the process, because when someone from the diaspora visits Croatia they are usually visiting where their parents are from, as I did and are probably going to touristic destinations, so it is quite difficult to have a clear picture in terms of living in the country. My advice to anyone moving to Croatia is do not expect it to be golden. However, with technology today, the world is becoming connected and Croatia is not a country that is lagging behind or disconnected. There will be struggles, however there are rising opportunities as Croatia is developing. Overall, Croatia to me is a country that has great potential, but you cannot expect the government to work for you, which I believe is a factor that negatively impacts Croatians. I think Croatia can be a great outsource centre for large multinational companies and those companies that hold large value in assets due to location and being able to offer lower wages, which the wages can be very good in Croatian terms.
- How were you perceived in Zagreb as foreigners/diaspora moving back - was the welcome warm?
I received some warm welcomes and some negative, which I think is normal for everyone when moving to a new country. I received a few comments, along the lines of judgment that diaspora does not have to work hard or has everything handed to them and that they come from money. This is not true, as to succeed, you must give it your all, and not rely on anyone else or anything else. However, Croatians are warm people, one thing that I have noticed about Croatians is that they are willing to come together to help for example when the devastating floods happened or donating money for someone that is sick or in need. I have to admit many were interested just to know about Canada and would sometimes ask me a million questions such as “why would you leave Canada”? Some would assume that everyone has lots of money in Canada and tell me that Croatia is horrible! After a while I found it difficult to deal with the frequent comments and questions about why I moved back, not due to the subject but the repetitiveness of comments and questions and it felt like a broken record being replayed over and over again.
- Through a lot of hard work, you have been very successful, while many foreigners have given up and left Croatia. What are the keys to success in doing business in Croatia in your opinion?
After working for the Slovakian company that had an office in Croatia for 3 and a half years – I had to decide what to do next. The Slovakian company ended up closing their offices, and I was left searching for work. Fortunately my wife and I had options, which is very lucky since many people do not. My wife is from Bugojno, Bosnia and Herzegovina and lived in Germany as of the mid-90s due to the war and then moved back to Bosnia and Herzegovina, specifically to Ljubuski. Also, due to my wife's and my own life experiences we had options if we decided to not stay in Croatia, to move to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Germany or Canada. During that period when I was without a job, my wife was pregnant and that definitely was a huge factor in making our decision to stay in Croatia.
The only question was if I did not find a job in Croatia, what would I do? Move to Austria, Germany, the UK? I always wanted to become an entrepreneur, and I was motivated by my father in many ways who himself was an entrepreneur, though I never could actually take that risk. I remember while working for the Slovakian company I would have to go to Bratislava often and while I was there I was shocked at how many foreigners lived there and worked for large multinational corporations such as AT&T, Skoda and others as outsourced workers. That is when I began to think, why would I not do the same in Croatia – firstly, English is my native language and secondly, I also had some work experience from Canada and worked in a multinational environment. I made the decision to become an entrepreneur and I decided to focus on something that I felt I was good at, which was finance and market research.
The name of my company became Cohres (Coherent Research) and my focus was the market outside of Croatia (North America and Western Europe) due to their financial capital and work opportunities. I started from my bedroom and worked long hours – quite frankly, being an entrepreneur in the starting phases can at times be lonely. Everything depends on you and you cannot rely on anyone but yourself to execute the idea, although I was lucky to have a family that supported me mentally.
In the end I noticed that being an entrepreneur for over 5 years, no one cares where you are from as long as you can get the job done (obviously there are specific situations where location is a factor). Over the past 5 years, Cohres has enhanced its portfolio working with many funds, asset managers, and investors, which made me change my company's focus in 2017 to investment research. The company now has worked both domestically and internationally serving a wide range of markets. Overall, I think with persistence many in Croatia can be successful and should ignore the negative influences and opinions because at the end of the day those comments do not do anything positive for your life but rather just serve as excuses.
- What is the diaspora community like in Zagreb and how integrated is it with locals?
To be honest I was shocked at how large and impactful the diaspora community is here in Croatia. For example, for Canadians there is the Canadian-Croatian Business Network, which has many members who have been in Croatia since the early 90s. Overall, I believe that Zagreb has a huge community for diaspora due to Zagreb being an economic power in Croatia. As for integration, I believe many have integrated with locals and in my opinion if you do not integrate yourself with locals, you will not be able to live in Croatia or anywhere else happily for over a year because you cannot bring Canada or whatever other country to Croatia and live a specific way, you need to adapt, just like anywhere else.
You can learn more about Cohres and connect with Daniel Nikic via the company website.
For more on the Croatian diaspora, check out the TCN dedicated section.
Are you a returnee who has moved back to Croatia and would like to be featured in this series? Please contact us on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
