Advising graduate students

A highlight of my recent trip to Montreal occurred when each of the members of the research advisory committee took a turn acting as a respondent to one of the grad student's papers. The students presented for about 15 minutes and then the RAC members, at least four of whom are editors of scholarly journals, provided their constructive comments and feedback. Many of their suggestions were generic and would be useful for anyone, and so I took a lot of notes, thinking they would be useful "graduate student advising" tips. I provide them below for your consideration.

When considering an article for publication, authors should be careful to ensure that the following elements are present and well articulated:

1. What are we going to learn (that we don't know already)?
2. Why do we want to know this ("so what?," in other words)?
3. How do we know that your conclusion matters / is real (validity)?

Another set of guides, with a similar theme, also suggests three considerations before publishing:

1. What is the research gap that you are trying to bridge? Be explicit.
2. Use the literature review instrumentally, rather than extensively. In other words, don't cite everything possible but rather cite those things that illustrate the research gap, the method you are using. Don't present the literature as an (unending) series of "major pillars" but instead exploit the literature to help construct your hypotheses.
3. Operationalize your concepts very carefully.