Testimonial: Being Self-Employed

Jacob Grant

Jacob is 29 years old and recently started his own audio equipment company. Still relatively small, his company focuses on installing high-end sound devices in recording and broadcast studios from Vancouver to Winnipeg. He has been living with Nancy for three years; they plan to get married next summer.

Jacob: With the kind of work I do, there are never any dull moments! Just last week, I had to be flown to Edmonton by helicopter. The little piece of plastic and copper on my lap was going to make the difference between having a live simulcast across the country or seeing a message on your TV saying: "We apologize for any technical difficulties...."

I definitely enjoy what I do. But it feels like there are never enough hours in the day. I always knew that I wanted to work for myself. I just never realized it was going to be this hectic!

Traveling was fun at first, but now I'm looking forward to the day when I can send someone else out on these crazy errands.

I've been thinking a lot about getting some more security in my life. Just last week Nancy and I had a talk....

We started listing some of our priorities and decided we needed to plan better for the future.

We used an online calculator to figure out how much life insurance coverage we might need. Nancy has some life insurance from working at the bank, but it quickly became obvious that I wasn't holding up my end of the bargain.

Without any coverage, how would I protect her if something serious were to happen to me? I had never thought about it in those terms until we started discussing it together.

Now that I work for myself, an important part of setting up my company is making sure I've at least got the basic life insurance coverage that I'd expect from an employer.