Tommy Saba has always appreciated golf for much more than the game itself. To him, golf represents an opportunity to enjoy beautiful surroundings, spend quality time outdoors, and experience some of the most scenic landscapes found in any sport. Whether visiting a local public course or exploring a new course while traveling, he enjoys the peaceful environment that golf naturally provides.
One of Tommy’s favorite parts of playing golf is taking in the scenery throughout each round. He enjoys walking along perfectly maintained fairways, admiring the carefully landscaped greens, watching wildlife around lakes and wooded areas, and appreciating the quiet beauty that makes every golf course different. The combination of open space, fresh air, and natural scenery creates an atmosphere that he finds both calming and enjoyable.
Tommy also enjoys the slower pace of golf, which allows time to appreciate the surroundings and enjoy meaningful conversations with the people he is playing with. Rather than focusing solely on the scorecard, he values the overall experience of being outside, exploring beautiful courses, and creating lasting memories with friends and family. Golf has become one of his favorite hobbies because it combines recreation, relaxation, and an appreciation for nature in a way that few other activities can. For Tommy, the greatest reward isn’t a perfect round—it’s the opportunity to spend the day on a beautiful golf course enjoying the experience.
What is your typical day, and how do you make it productive?
My typical day starts early, which I’ve found is the key to making it productive. I get the most important things done before distractions pile up. But I always try to carve out time for the things that recharge me, and for me, that’s golf.
I’m not going to pretend I’m any good at it. My scorecard would tell you that pretty quickly. What draws me to the course is the setting. There’s something about walking across an open fairway in the morning, with the dew still on the grass and the tree lines in the distance, that resets my head. It’s quiet in a way most places aren’t anymore. No screens, no noise, just space.
That contrast is actually what makes the rest of my day work. The course forces me to slow down and pay attention to where I am, and I bring that same focus back to whatever I’m working on. A productive day for me isn’t about cramming in as much as possible. It’s about being deliberate, staying present, and giving the important things my full attention, whether that’s a task at my desk or just lining up a shot I’ll probably shank into the woods anyway.
How do you bring ideas to life?
I bring ideas to life by starting simple and refining as I go. I’ve never been someone who waits for a perfect plan before moving. I’d rather get a rough version down, see how it actually holds up, and adjust from there.
Golf is a decent comparison, even though I’m not good at it. You can stand on the tee and picture the perfect shot, but the ball doesn’t care about your intentions. You hit it, you see where it lands, and then you figure out your next move from there. The idea only becomes real once you’ve committed to the swing and dealt with whatever happens next.
I approach ideas the same way. I think them through enough to know the direction, then I commit and start building. The feedback from actually doing it teaches me more than endless planning ever could. I pay attention to what’s working, cut what isn’t, and keep adjusting until the thing in my head matches the thing in front of me. Being willing to course-correct without getting discouraged is what gets an idea from a vague thought to something finished.
What’s one trend that excites you?
One trend that excites me is the growing push toward getting outside and disconnecting. For a while, it felt like everything was moving in the opposite direction; more screens, more notifications, more of life happening indoors and online. Lately, I’ve noticed a real shift back toward valuing time outdoors and being present in a physical space.
That resonates with me because it’s a big part of why I enjoy golf. I’m not on the course for my scorecard—that much is obvious to anyone who’s seen me play. I’m there for the landscape and the quiet. Open space, tree lines, the feeling of being somewhere that isn’t demanding your attention every second. It’s one of the few activities where the setting itself is the point.
What excites me about the trend is that more people seem to be recognizing how much that kind of environment matters. Whether it’s golf, hiking, or just spending time somewhere green, there’s value in stepping out of the constant noise. I think we’re going to see more of that, and I’m glad people are starting to protect that kind of time rather than treating it as something optional.
What is one habit that helps you be productive?
One habit that helps me be productive is protecting a block of time each day where I fully step away from work. It sounds backwards, but disconnecting on purpose is what keeps me sharp when I’m actually working.
For me, that’s getting out to the course. I’m not there for my game, which anyone who’s watched me play could confirm. I’m there because it pulls me completely out of work mode. Walking an open fairway with the tree lines in the distance, no screen in my hand, gives my head a chance to reset. I almost always come back to whatever I was working on with a clearer view of it than when I left.
The broader habit is recognizing that productivity isn’t about grinding without stopping. It’s about managing your energy so the hours you do spend working are focused instead of foggy. Building in that deliberate downtime, somewhere quiet and away from the noise, is what lets me bring real attention to the things that matter rather than running on empty.
What advice would you give your younger self?
The advice I’d give my younger self is to stop being so hard on yourself when things don’t go perfectly. I spent a lot of energy early on treating every mistake like it mattered more than it did, and most of the time, it just got in the way.
Golf taught me this one, oddly enough, and I’m genuinely bad at golf. When you’re learning, every bad shot feels like a verdict on whether you belong out there. But the people who actually enjoy the game figure out pretty quickly that you’re going to hit bad shots no matter what, and the round keeps going regardless. The ones who let a single mistake ruin the next five holes are the ones who never have any fun. The ball’s already in the rough. Dwelling on it doesn’t bring it back.
I’d tell my younger self to hold things a little more loosely. Take the work seriously, but not every individual stumble. Keep your eyes on where you’re headed instead of replaying what already went wrong. Most of the things I agonized over turned out not to matter, and the energy I burned worrying would’ve been better spent just taking the next shot.
Tell us something you believe that almost nobody agrees with you on.
Something I believe that almost nobody agrees with me on is that the score is the least interesting thing about golf. Most people treat the number as the entire point, and I think they’re missing what’s actually valuable about being out there.
For me, a round is good or bad based on almost everything except how I played. The light across the course in the early morning, how quiet it is, the walk between holes, whether the day felt unhurried. I’ll have a genuinely great time on the course and shoot something embarrassing, and to me, those two facts have nothing to do with each other. Most golfers would call that backwards. If you’re not trying to get better and post a lower number, why are you even out there?
But I think that logic quietly ruins a lot of things, not just golf. We take experiences that are valuable on their own and reduce them to a metric and then we only feel good if the metric improves. I’d rather judge things by whether they were worth doing in the moment. By that standard, a bad round in a beautiful place beats a good round I rushed through and didn’t notice. Almost nobody agrees with me, but I’m convinced the scoreboard is the most overrated part of most things.
What is the one thing you repeatedly do and recommend everyone else do?
The one thing I repeatedly do and recommend to everyone is to spend regular time somewhere with no agenda attached to it. Not productive time, not improvement time, just time in a place you find pleasant for no reason other than that you find it pleasant.
For me, that place is a golf course, though my reasons have nothing to do with golf itself. I go for the open space and the quiet. I’d recommend it to anyone whether or not they ever pick up a club, because the specific activity matters less than the act of putting yourself somewhere calm with nothing to accomplish. Most people don’t do this. Even their downtime has a goal attached: get fitter, get better, get something out of it.
What I’d tell people is that some things shouldn’t have to earn their place by being useful. You don’t need a reason to stand in a nice spot and let your mind settle. I do it consistently, and it does more for my general state of mind than anything I could point to as obviously productive. The recommendation is simple: find your version of that place and protect the time without needing it to pay off in any measurable way.
When you feel overwhelmed or unfocused, what do you do?
When I feel overwhelmed or unfocused, I step away and get outside. The instinct when you’re swamped is to push harder and grind through it, but I’ve learned that forcing it when my head is cluttered usually just produces worse work and more frustration.
Getting to the course is my version of a reset. The specific thing I’m doing matters less than the change of setting: open space, fresh air, and a few hours where nothing is demanding an immediate answer from me. By the time I’ve walked it off, whatever felt tangled usually looks a lot more manageable. The problem didn’t change, but my ability to look at it clearly did.
The underlying move is just recognizing when to stop. Pushing through a foggy head rarely works for me. Stepping fully away, even briefly, almost always does. I come back with my focus restored and a clearer sense of what actually needs my attention versus what just felt loud in the moment.
What is one strategy that has helped you grow your business or advance in your career?
One strategy that’s helped me is being patient and playing the long game rather than chasing quick wins. Early on, it’s tempting to want everything to happen fast, but I’ve found that the things worth having tend to build slowly, through consistent effort over time rather than one big move.
The way this plays out is in how I approach setbacks. Instead of getting rattled when something doesn’t go my way, I treat it as information and adjust. Golf actually reinforced this for me, even though I’m nowhere near good at it. A bad hole doesn’t end the round. You take the next shot, you keep your composure, and you stay focused on where you’re trying to end up rather than dwelling on the shot you just dumped into the rough. Getting frustrated only makes the next swing worse.
I’ve carried that same mindset into my work. I focus on steady progress, I don’t let one bad outcome throw off my whole approach, and I keep my attention on the longer arc rather than any single moment. Staying composed and consistent, especially when things aren’t going perfectly, has done more for me than any shortcut ever could.
What is one failure in your career, how did you overcome it, and what lessons did you take away from it?
One failure I’d point to, especially earlier on, was taking on more than I could realistically deliver. I said yes to too much at once, convinced I could handle all of it, and ended up stretched thin enough that the quality of everything suffered. Nothing collapsed dramatically, but I wasn’t doing my best work on anything, and I had to admit that the problem was my own overcommitment rather than bad luck or circumstance.
The way I overcame it was unglamorous: I scaled back, got honest about my actual capacity, and started being willing to say no or not yet instead of yes to everything. I focused on doing fewer things well rather than many things poorly. It meant disappointing a few people in the short term, but the work I did deliver got noticeably better once I stopped spreading myself across too much at once.
The lesson I took away is that capacity is a real constraint, not a sign of weakness, and pretending otherwise just guarantees worse outcomes. I’m more deliberate now about what I commit to. I’d rather take on less and stand behind all of it than overpromise and quietly fall short. Learning to protect my focus, and to be honest with myself about limits, did more for the quality of my work than any amount of trying to do everything.
What is one business idea you’re willing to give away to our readers?
One business idea, and a concrete one rather than advice: a “scenery-first” walking course, designed and marketed for people who want to be on a golf course for the landscape and the walk rather than the competition.
The premise is that a huge number of people enjoy being on a course but feel out of place because everything about the game is built around scoring and skill. So, you build the experience around them instead. Think a relaxed par-3 or executive-length course routed through the most scenic parts of the property, with generous fairways and forgiving layouts so nobody’s hunting for balls in the woods all afternoon. No posted scorecards unless you want one. No pressure to keep pace with serious players, because serious players aren’t the target customer. You’d pair it with good walking paths, benches and overlooks at the prettiest spots, and a clubhouse that functions more like a nice café than a pro shop.
The revenue model is broader than green fees. You’re selling the setting, so you lean into that: morning walking memberships, sunset twilight rates, the grounds as a venue for small events, photography, and casual gatherings. You court the exact people the traditional golf industry underserves: beginners, older walkers, couples, anyone who wants the environment without the intensity. The course becomes a calm outdoor space that happens to involve clubs, rather than an athletic test that happens to be outdoors.
The reason I think it has legs is that the industry has spent decades optimizing for the committed, score-focused golfer and treating everyone else as someone to either convert or tolerate. There’s an underserved market of people who’d happily pay to walk a beautiful course at their own pace with zero judgment, and almost nobody is building specifically for them.
What is one piece of software that helps you be productive? How do you use it?
One piece of software I rely on is a simple calendar app, and the reason it makes the list is that I use it to protect time, not just track it.
Most people use a calendar to log meetings and obligations, the things other people want from them. I use it just as much to block out the time that isn’t for anyone else. My time on the course goes on the calendar the same way a meeting would. If it’s scheduled, it’s real, and it doesn’t get quietly eaten by whatever comes up. Treating that downtime as a fixed commitment rather than a maybe is the whole point, because the stuff that recharges you is exactly what gets sacrificed first when you leave it informal.
So, the way I use it is less about productivity software in the usual sense and more about being deliberate with where my hours go. I block the focused work, I block the time away, and I defend both. The app itself is nothing special, any calendar would do. What makes it useful is the discipline of putting the things that matter, including rest, on the schedule and then actually honoring them.
What is the best $100 you recently spent? What and why?
The best $100 I recently spent was on a golf lesson, which is funny given that I’m openly not trying to get good at the game.
Here’s why it was worth it anyway. I didn’t book it to lower my score. I booked it because I’d gotten to the point where my swing was bad enough that I was spending half the round retrieving balls from places balls shouldn’t go, and that was pulling me out of the part I actually like, the walk, the setting, the calm. The lesson wasn’t about becoming a real golfer. It was about getting just competent enough that the game stays in the background and the experience I’m there for stays in the foreground. A hundred dollars to stop fighting my own swing and just enjoy being out there was an easy trade.
What made it the best money, rather than just decent money, is that it fixed the right problem. I wasn’t unhappy with my scores, I was unhappy that flailing around was interrupting the thing I value. One session smoothed that out enough that I can now walk a course and stay in the headspace I came for. Spending a small amount to remove friction from something you already love is, to me, about the best use of $100 there is.
Do you have a favorite book or podcast you’ve gotten a ton of value from and why?
A podcast I’ve gotten a lot of value from is “Acquired.” “Acquired” tells the stories and strategies of great companies, going deep on how a business actually got built rather than skimming the surface. The episodes are long and thorough, and that’s the appeal. Instead of a quick news hit, you get the full arc of how a company came together, the decisions that mattered, and why things played out the way they did.
The value for me is that it rewards patience, which is the same thing I value away from work. The hosts don’t rush. They sit with a story, follow the threads, and let the full picture develop over a couple of hours. There’s something in common between that and the reason I like being out on a golf course—neither one is about cramming as much as possible into the least time. Both are about slowing down enough to actually absorb what’s in front of you. The episodes that have stuck with me are the ones where I came away understanding not just what a company did, but the reasoning underneath it.
What keeps me coming back is that it’s substance over noise. It respects your attention rather than competing for it, and I always finish an episode having actually learned something I can think about later, on a long walk or otherwise.
What’s a movie or series you recently enjoyed and why?
A series I recently enjoyed is “Full Swing,” the Netflix documentary that follows professional golfers through a season on tour. What I liked about it is that it pulls back the curtain on a side of the game I don’t experience and honestly don’t share: the competitive pressure, the stakes, the mental grind of playing for a living. I’m someone who’s on a course for the calm and the scenery, so watching people for whom every shot carries real weight was a genuinely different window into the same game I enjoy for completely opposite reasons.
The value in it for me was the contrast. It made me appreciate my own relationship with golf more clearly. These players are carrying a level of pressure that would drain all the enjoyment out of it for me and watching them reminded me why I’m happy being exactly the kind of golfer who doesn’t keep score. At the same time, the series does a good job of making them human rather than just athletes; you see the doubt, the setbacks, the way they handle a bad round, and that’s compelling regardless of whether you care about the leaderboard.
What kept me watching was that it works on both levels. If you love the competition, it delivers that. And if, like me, you’re more interested in the game as a setting than a sport, it still gives you something, a look at the people and the places, shot beautifully, with enough real human story underneath to hold your attention.
Key learnings
- Value can come from an activity without it needing to be done well or competitively—the benefit of getting onto a golf course, in this case, comes from the setting and the walk rather than from skill or score.
- Protecting time for unstructured, no-agenda activity supports focus and productivity rather than detracting from it—deliberately scheduling and defending downtime tends to improve the quality of work done during working hours.
- Stepping away when overwhelmed often resolves more than pushing harder does; a change of setting can restore clarity that grinding through a cluttered head cannot.
- Spending modestly to remove what interrupts an experience often returns more than the cost suggests.
- Judging experiences by whether they were worthwhile in the moment, rather than only by a measurable outcome, leads to a healthier relationship with both leisure and work.