Sometimes it makes excellent sense.

It may seem that, patenting issues aside, speedy publication of research in scientific journals is always the best strategy. Often it really is. Think of a young assistant professor facing tenure review in a few years. Is he (or, less likely, she) going to hold anything back? Probably not, it is not a good idea. Neither is it wise for organic chemists to take their time when submitting first total syntheses of newly discovered natural products for publication. It's a race, being first is important.

For any professor, the forces acting in favor of publishing quickly and comprehensively are:

• necessity to maintain a stream of publications for grants and promotions;
• danger of similar or identical work being published by another research group first (i.e. getting scooped);
• pressure exerted by students and postdocs who need publications to advance their own careers.

But this isn't all there is to it. Publications are not created equal, because not all research is viewed as — or is — equally important. Immediate judgment of the potential importance of new science, however, is a difficult task at best. Nonetheless, this kind of judgment is necessary, even if it cannot possibly be 100% objective.

What follows is that professors have to "sell" their accomplishments to the scientific community. In other words, to favorably present their work and to advocate its value effectively. Whatever gets published, cannot be unpublished or published again. So it pays to play the cards right and make it count — get the paper accepted into a higher-profile journal, make a splash, dazzle and impress academic peers.

In a competitive setting, consequences include:

• polishing a manuscript to perfection by editing and re-editing can be worth it, even if it takes a year;
• holding off publication until more results are obtained sometimes beats publishing more frequently but less impressively;
• publication of proof-of-principle research can be costly as it opens the door for others to steal the thunder of more exciting applications;
• given more promising things to spend time on, preparation of lower impact papers for publication loses priority and can be abandoned altogether.

Needless to say, these kinds of considerations have to be weighed against the factors pushing the decision in favor of (quicker) publication. But there are circumstances when the pro-disclosure forces become weaker and lose dominance. Including:

• tenure;
• ability to secure funding despite delays in publication;
• research directions where competition is unlikely to be met, such as those based on novel (and unpublished) ideas.

All in all, exercising some (or a lot of) restraint with publishing can be a viable strategy. As such, it is bound to be employed by professors in academia. Those who could use it but don't will be less successful in their careers than those who do. And who in the world wants to be less successful?

Academic science is a tournament. The number of open faculty positions is always limited. Only a handful of them in the major league places like Harvard, Scripps or MIT. University education, PhD and postdoc work are all stages in the competition to land a job in the academia. Making tenure is a hard-earned success for a scientist. But it only marks the end of the qualification rounds. The game is just beginning.

How does a professor succeed in the academia? What is the competition for? Three things.

1. Funding. The money, which mainly comes from research grants. It is given out on a competitive basis. I like to call it monopoly money, because it can only be used "in the game". Professors can not cash or pocket it. This money is used to buy things (equipment, supplies, reagents) and hire people (PhD students, postdocs, technicians, secretaries) for the lab.

2. Manpower. Graduate students and postdocs, that is. They drive the research forward. Their power comes not only from numbers, but from individual fitness as well. The good ones do not require higher pay, but are more picky when choosing professors to work for. Productivity is affected by the professor's approach to workforce management and motivation.

3. Name "size". As they say, you have to "get your name out there" and "make a name for yourself". Successful professors have "big names". This one refers to professor's personal credentials, reputation, recognition and fame. It is affected by presentation and marketing of research accomplishments to the rest of the scientific community.

To survive and succeed, a science professor has to compete in all three "events". Neither can be disregarded. What's more, they are tightly linked: each one affects the other two. A loss of funding, for example, results in inability to support a larger research group and attract better students. Less money to do research also means fewer accomplishments to put your name on. Reputation of a star scientist, on the other hand, gets a professor the best students and helps to secure handsome funding. And so on.

It can be referred to as the FMN triangle (Funding-Manpower-Name). This is what the game is about. And it has profound consequences for everyone in Academia, the advancement of science, and taxpayers around the globe.

Further reading:

1. Publishing strategically: You got to know when to hold 'em — Name
2. Is your PI a dick or a loser? — Manpower