For the Chronicle of Higher Education, I debunked the myth that publishing in academic journals will get you a job, and encouraged scholars to take a broader perspective to research and writing:

Most scholars hesitate to take this approach even when their writing has had proven appeal, for it appeals to those who do not “count”. But what “counts” should be producing work of lasting intellectual value instead of market ephemerality. What “counts” should be the quality of the research and writing, not the professional advantages you gain from producing it. This is particularly true for new Ph.D.’s, because in all likelihood, those advantages may not exist—at least not within academia.

Making your work “count” on its own intellectual merit helps rescue you from the sense of personal failure that accompanies loss on the job market. When you orient your scholarship toward a future that never comes, it can start to feel like you have no future. When you orient your scholarship toward its obvious yet overlooked purpose—furthering human knowledge—its value does not need to be determined by others, because the value lies in the work itself. This is what counts.

Read What’s the Point of Academic Publishing? at CHE’s Vitae.