In any field of endeavor, it is impossible to make a significant contribution without first being strongly influenced by past achievements within that field.

Inspiration is something which everyone needs in order to achieve one's goals and reach new heights, so
to a great extent I do believe that past achievements in a any field of work would enable a person make significant contributions in their field of interest. However having said that ,it would not be completely impossible for people to draw inspiration by achievements from other fields and incorporate their ideas into their field of interest.

Past achievements would certainly give an idea and direction to people on how they could better themselves and certainly play a major role in whichever field they are in. For Instance, the very reason i am writing the GRE exam , is because after long period of planning and contemplating on how to advance my IT career, I found inspiration in my college mate who had taken the GRE exam couple of years ago to study in the United states and is now working for a highly reputed IT firm.

Inspiration cannot be restricted to their respective fields alone, it can be drawn from any field of work.
A real world example would be the Television adaptation of Game of Thrones which was inspired by the Game of Thrones novels which was published in the early 90's. Little did the creator of the show and the author of the book know that the show would become a supreme hit with the viewers across the world and as a result generated a lot of revenue.

In conclusion, as stated before I beleive inspiration is a big enabler for people to achieve great success in thier field and it is not restricted to any specific field.