Yes, he should recalibrate his ideas of why he wanted to work in academia.
Today if you want to get ahead you need a patron and some people who know enough to bounce ideas off them.
I think it increasingly the case that universities are the worst place to send a real intellectual. Some of the most useless people in the world are respected here.
I've been to one, I'll say what I think. I think most university people are posers. Completely unfit. Institutionalized.
Then they are requested to perform. And they cannot. They like are those plants specialized to perform only in a certain Alpine microclimate.
Result: psychological sickness and poor pay. Employers don't know what to do with these people. And society insists on manufacturing more of them. It's a sick system, and it is best to get out while you're still honest.