Basics

Jonathan has written a good post about "the scholarship base". It suggests that a research project has an invisible supporting "mass", or what Hemingway would call a "dignity of movement". Research results are not something you can just produce to order. You have to be working on your base. Every now and then, something emerges, and you can then spend some time getting it into shape for publication. Most of the time, however, you are maintaining your knowledge base.

I think this insight is an important one, also for university administrators to recognize. Slow and steady does it.