Any sports fans out there? When a great player in a certain sport (baseball, football, basketball etc) becomes a “free agent” (i.e. a player that is no longer under contract with a particular team and is free to sign with any other team) the salary that player will command will be based almost 99% on past performance. For example, if a baseball pitcher has already won several Cy Young awards as the best pitcher in baseball, that guy will receive an enormous free agent contract from a new team. And the reason: the new team forking over all of that $$$ has every expectation that the pitcher will perform as well in the future.
However, in the baseball example, there is certainly a chance that injury, pitching in a different stadium, aging and other factors may cause the future performance to not being close to the excellence demonstrated in the past. So, in sports, past performance is not always a predictor of the future.
Let’s turn the discussion to the health care arena. If a person has exhibited great health for many years, does this predict that the future will also be healthy for that person? How about weight control? If a person has tried numerous “diets” over decades to shed weight and has never been successful in keeping the weight off, does that predict with 100% accuracy that the person will never be able to control weight?
Clearly focusing on health care, past performance is not always a predictor of the future. Behavioral changes are possible, although if you were a betting person, it is more likely that old behaviors are difficult to break. The bottom line is that we do, in fact, control many aspects of our lives and despite the past history, we can impact the future. This is not easy, but it is “doable”.
How about very successful performers that had very unsuccessful pasts? No one is more synonymous with the rise of pop music than Madonna. She had a series of major failures before she became the star she is today. When she first moved to New York City, she was fired from a series of jobs and barely managed to support herself. Many days, she had just a few dollars to her name. She also experienced violence in the city and was rejected by multiple managers. Finally, she managed to secure a record deal and became the biggest pop star of the 1980s. Enjoy “Crazy For You”
