Performance measurements are probably the single most selection feature of any stock mutual fund. Figures available in the performance statistics are the important one, because they provide the past records of a mutual fund. You can very well access the work done by the portfolio manager of any fund company and can find the best portfolio for your investments.

But a question arise here is will a stock fund manager with a better past record be able to make quality results in the future time periods?

Good past performance can be the result of absolute luck, or it can be due to a well thought approach that is consistently applied. When the results came due to luck only then the chance of quality results will not happen all times. But when the results came out due to better planning than the manager can do it again and again because he has the ability to make a better plan to invest the collected money.

This means that at some stages you have to look above the statistic where you have to look for the reasons to good results, so you can get profitable mutual funds in your investment bag. To get right kind of mutual funds in your collection you have to examine the planning and approaches used by different fund managers.

How a good approach looks like?

It is not an easy task to access the approach used by a fund manager to invest the collected money in different investment opportunities. You can never get the ideas of mutual fund managers from the style and size of the mutual funds.

A good approach consists of an investment philosophy and a selection process that follows from the investment philosophy and is consistently applied.