"Edison says, 'Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.' He may have been exaggerating, but the idea is that solid work, steadily applied, gets you surprisingly far. The steady application of effort with a little bit more work, 'intelligently applied is what does it. That's the trouble; drive, misapplied, doesn't get you anywhere. I've often wondered why so many of my good friends at Bell Labs who worked as hard or harder than I did, didn't have so much to show for it. The misapplication of effort is a very serious matter. Just hard work is not enough - it must be applied sensibly."
From: http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.pdf

Oh... so thaaaaat's what advisors were supposed to do? Help to guide the application of effort? Sincerely, just avoiding to misguide would be already a good thing.