yea its pretty important to be published on your CV. some people have to write dozens of papers before even acknowleged by a employer(if going for academia). the side effect is the complaint of low-quality papers that are being written up(quantity of quality).

if people are lucky on undergrad to be published, must be in a lab volunteering, it gives you the biggest jumpstart.(again this also has thier own set of problems too). having wet lab work, and being published if you are planing to go into research. the main problem is faculty are notoriously competitive, because of the limited space. and then trying to get lab work at undergrad or MS, is also pretty challenging too.