This summer I joined Vistage, a CEO coaching and peer mentoring organization. When I joined I learned the group was going golfing together in about two months. I had never swung a golf club before in my life. So I decided to take some golf lessons and see how I liked it. I took the lessons and hit the driving range a couple of times a week during that two months, all the while driven forward by my desire to not look foolish in front of my Vistage peers.

The morning of the golf event I arrived early and hit the driving range one last time. It was my best (actually my only decent) hour of practice ever and I went into the day with some optimism. I certainly did everything I reasonably could to prepare (more like cram) for the event. So there we are at the first tee. I set up and, feeling pretty good, took the first swing of the “real thing” I had prepared for. My club broke. In half. I stood there holding an empty shaft and watching the head come to a landing 30 yards away. I just shook my head and laughed.

In spite of all the worrying I did about that moment and all the times I played it out in my head, what actually happened was completely outside of anything I imagined or planned for.

I borrowed a driver from the pro shop, and played the round (not well, by any stretch, but my peers were very supportive).

I think this unexpected club breaking event illustrates a common property of life. I estimate that at least half the time, when we try to make contingency plans, the thing that actually goes wrong (or right) is something we didn’t even consider during our planning.

This is kind of a tough reality to do anything about. But perhaps the worst mistake is to think we know for sure how things will go because we have a plan. When making decisions about the future, knowing things probably won’t go according to plan is a good starting point.

Here’s why you need strong boundaries in order to be successful.

You are much more likely to achieve success (to get the outcome you want) if you take action. Passive non-action will take you to an outcome, but it probably won’t be the outcome you want.

Even more effective than taking action is taking deliberate, focused action with a specific outcome in mind. Deliberate action, focused on a goal, taken consistently over time, is a killer recipe for success.

Boundaries are the separation between you, and other people. Without boundaries, you won’t be able to take deliberate, focused action because you’ll be swayed in random directions by the competing opportunities and requests that come up along the way. Saying yes to deliberate, focused action toward your goal means saying no to countless interruptions, distractions, and people with agendas that don’t fit yours. Saying yes to one thing means so no to everything else, and that’s a lot of stuff, which means a lot of saying no. Without boundaries, which give you the ability to say no, you can’t have self-control.

Success requires deliberate, focused action. Deliberate, focused action requires self-control. Self-control requires boundaries.

One of the companies I own, ATS Acoustics, made the Inc. 5000 list for 2010. This list ranks the fastest-growing non-tiny companies in the U.S. based on their size in 2009 compared to their size in 2007. We ranked at position 1,272. This is a pretty cool accomplishment and we are pleased and grateful.

Five years ago I, and Phil, my only employee at the time, decided to set up a recording studio in unused space in our office building. I clearly remember saying, “It will probably never make any money. Who pays for recording studios any more? But it will be fun and we’re excited about it so I guess we’ll go ahead.” I had zero foresight to the spinoff business, ATS Acoustics, that came out of the recording studio project, and is now a multi-million dollar company. The seed grew into something much bigger. It was impossible to predict or measure the size of the tree at the seed stage.

Five weeks ago I was working on my Time Audit iPhone app, and I almost dropped the project. I said “It will probably never make enough money to pay for itself. App development is super-competitive. But it’s cool technology and I want to learn it, so I guess I’ll finish it.” And I did. Last week a government-funded research group came to me with interest in contracting a custom version of Time Audit that will be used in transportation safety research. Their research will probably end up saving lives, and Time Audit might have a little role in that. Time Audit is not a tree yet, it’s just a seedling, but it’s already clear that I had no ability to predict, let alone measure, the future potential at the seed stage.

Despite this difficulty in measuring, rational planning depends on estimates of the future potential of seeds. We have to decide which seeds to spend time and money nurturing, and which seeds to ignore. I don’t think this challenge can be reduced to simple answers. Here are two observations:

1) It’s not necessary to evaluate the future value of each seed accurately. It’s only necessary to correctly evaluate the relative potential of each seed you have to work with. Invest resources in the seed(s) you estimate have the most potential compared to the others.

2) In both of these cases, I felt resistance in me saying “I really should not do this project just because I’m energized about it.” I felt it was a little irresponsible to do an iffy project just for fun, but I did the project anyway. I couldn’t have been more wrong in thinking it was irresponsible to have fun starting that recording studio. So pay attention to your energy and interest level, even if the numbers are foggy at the seed stage.

You can’t manage what you can’t measure. This is true of time too.

A time audit is an exercise in tracking your time to see what you spend it on, and how that matches with your values. Almost everyone feels like there is not enough time to go around. With a time audit report in front of you, you can make informed decisions about what to do about that.

I did this exercise last year as part of the leadership coaching program I am a part of. I used a spreadsheet, but at the time I thought this would be a perfect candidate for an iPhone app. About a month ago I decided to make the app.

So here it is. My Time Audit iPhone App. It beats the spreadsheet hands down.