Who is Ivica Kljajić and why is his life story worth the time?

He was born in 1980 in Slavonski Brod, Croatia. Just a few months later, he was clinically dead – yes, you read that right. Doctors gave him only an 8% chance of survival, and it's a real miracle he even had the chance to be here today to tell you his life story. The doctor who saved his life through surgery – the esteemed Dr. Bujas told his mother that he wanted to adopt him because he was convinced he would become a fascinating person and wanted to follow his life journey firsthand, which for his mother was unimaginable.

Ivica's relationship with his mother from day one to today is the only beautiful and unbreakable family story. Dr. Bujas, unfortunately, passed away several years ago, but that doesn't stop him from continuing to watch over him from heaven. Although his life was hanging by a thread from a young age, he showed what it means to be a fighter, and nothing has changed to this day. In Slavonski Brod, he completed elementary and high school, and in the fall of 2000, he embarked on his journey to Germany as a gastarbeiter, like many of you, with 300 German marks in his pocket, a suitcase in his hand, and a beautiful vision of a better life across the border. In 2001, he began working as an assistant caregiver in a nursing home and stayed there until 2013. During this period, he worked with love and gladly helped others, but he always felt something was missing. There was no sense of personal fulfillment and happiness. He felt like he was working for the goals of others and not his own and the goals of his closest family. The desire to leave a mark when he's no longer here was the fire that slowly smoldered in him and ignited the moment he was laid off overnight due to an excess of workers in the company and ended up on the street. This traumatic event and feelings of worthlessness ignited the flame in him that he needed to change something in his life and take matters into his own hands. The situation couldn't have been more challenging; he had a child for whom he and his wife had countless sleepless nights. Despite everything, they decided to invest in education, believing in a better tomorrow. They decided that Ivica should study at a college abroad, and they would finance it themselves. They put everything on the line, without a plan B, and embarked on what was then a very risky challenge, going all in.

Four years later, Ivica successfully graduated from college and began working as a medical informatician. He worked in IT for the next six years until 2019. However, that position did not quench his thirst for success and knowledge. In early 2019, when half of the people in the company were laid off and his job was again “hanging by a thread”, he experienced a déjà vu similar to that in 2013, but this time with two young children and a wife by his side. This was the turning point where he decided to take control of his life and start shaping his future. He voluntarily resigned from the company and embarked on a completely new financial path. Friends and family considered this move to be too risky and foolish, and they couldn't understand why he was quitting a job he had studied four years for, a position that was indeed well-paid, especially with two young children and a large home loan to repay for many more years. To be honest, he was torn between safety and belief that he was meant for more. He questioned everything he had done and built until he found his WHY.

His desire was greater than fear, stronger than all those voices telling him: “Stay where you are.”, “You're safe here, don't risk and lose everything you've built!” He mustered the courage, stepped out of his comfort zone, which he had built all his life, and, without any connections and parents backing him up, without a safety net, he completely changed his career direction at the beginning of 2019 and started working at DVAG – the largest and most significant financial company in Europe where he found his business family and finally got the feeling of belonging and security. Very quickly, two years later, he achieved success, becoming the employee of the year and the second-best Coach of the year, holding that title for two years in a row. The story goes that he is now on his way to becoming a regional director with his business family – the most prestigious business achievement in such a large company. That success is Ivica's great pride, especially his team in which he found everything he had been striving for in his business for years. His business family. ❤️

For the last 3 and a half years, he has been working and writing his magnum opus, a book called YOUR Integration which will help many of our people to ease the beginnings of life in Germany, and much more than that. The book describes his life journey in an authentic way in which many will surely recognize themselves, providing clear guidelines on how to successfully integrate in Germany and how to avoid all those fatal mistakes and pitfalls along the way. Had he had that book 22 years ago when he came to Germany, he would have paid for it in gold, considering that instead, he paid dearly for his mistakes. He searched for such a book for years without success. There were no such books for our people in Germany – UNTIL NOW!”