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‘The simple idea was to make it easier for people to do what we did’: Daniel Nivern on his international recruitment agency

After spending his postgrad summer teaching English in a small town near Beijing, Nivern tells Andy Martin how he saw how he could help others from around the world work in the east

Saturday 17 August 2019 16:43 BST
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Daniel Nivern (centre) works to place people in the Chinese job market
Daniel Nivern (centre) works to place people in the Chinese job market

It doesn’t matter whether you like Brexit or not,” Daniel Nivern was saying as we walked up Baker Street, “you still have to take China into account.” Of course he would say that as co-founder and CEO of CRCC Asia, which is the world’s biggest provider of work experience placements in China. But, all the same, he has a strong case. “Do you know what percentage of people live in Asia?” he asked. I guessed around 50 per cent. It turns out to be 60 per cent. 4 billion people in Asia. A mere 700 million in Europe. QED.

Nivern, now 37, is a posterboy for the utility of studying modern languages. At 14 he went on a school exchange to Paris. Brought up in Manchester, he found himself living across the street from the Louvre. At 17 he got a summer job in a factory outside Paris, packing cakes in boxes, where he was known as “Anglais”. “I was impressed that, even in the industrial zone, they still stopped for a proper lunch with a baguette and a bottle of wine.”

This was the summer of 1998, the year of the Mondial in France. He tried – and failed – to get into the World Cup final at the Stade de France, but watched France beat Brazil 3-0 on a screen outside and saw the whole city go mad. “I couldn’t get home and I couldn’t get to work the next day either.” He went on to take French and German at Keble College, Oxford, specialising in 17th century French theatre. “Learning languages opens up your eyes to other parts of the world,” he says. “I just wanted to keep on going.”

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