Директор отвечает за проект.

The director is responsible for the project.

Breakdown of Директор отвечает за проект.

• проект: the project
• директор: the director
• отвечать за: to be responsible for

Questions & Answers about Директор отвечает за проект.

Why is it отвечает за and not отвечает на in this sentence?

The verb отвечать has different meanings depending on the preposition:

• отвечать на + accusative = to answer (a question, a letter)

  • отвечать на вопрос – to answer a question
  • отвечать на письмо – to answer a letter

• отвечать за + accusative = to be responsible for, to answer for (be held accountable for)

  • отвечать за проект – to be responsible for the project
  • отвечать за результат – to be responsible for the result

In Директор отвечает за проект, the meaning is clearly about responsibility, not about replying to something, so за is the correct preposition.

What case is проект in, and why?

Проект is in the accusative singular:

• Nominative: проект
• Accusative (inanimate, masculine): проект (same form as nominative)

It’s accusative because the preposition за takes the accusative case when it means “for / responsible for / in favor of”:

• отвечать за проект – answer for the project
• бороться за мир – fight for peace
• голосовать за кандидата – vote for the candidate

So the structure is:
отвечает (verb) + за (preposition) + проект (accusative object).

What does the preposition за mean here? I thought за was “behind” or “beyond”.

За has several meanings in Russian; the meaning depends on context and case. In this sentence it means “for / in charge of / responsible for”.

Some common meanings of за:

1. Responsibility / support (with accusative):

   • отвечать за проект – be responsible for the project
   • бороться за права – fight for rights
   • я за тебя – I’m on your side / I support you

2. Location “behind” (usually with instrumental):

   • за домом – behind the house

3. Movement to a position “behind / to (a surface)” (with accusative):

   • сесть за стол – sit down at the table

In Директор отвечает за проект, it’s the first meaning: responsibility.

What tense and aspect is отвечает, and why not a different form like ответит?

Отвечает is:

• Present tense
• 3rd person singular
• Imperfective aspect of отвечать

Imperfective is used for:

• Ongoing states: Он отвечает за проект. – He is (in general) responsible for the project.
• Regular / general facts: That’s his role or duty.

The perfective form ответить normally means “to answer (once, completed)”, and with за it does not express this kind of ongoing responsibility. You cannot say ×директор ответит за проект with the same meaning; that would sound like “the director will answer for the project (be held to account at some point)”, not “is responsible for it as his job”.

Could I say Директор ответственен за проект instead? What’s the difference?

Yes, you can say Директор ответственен за проект. This is correct and means almost the same thing.

Nuances:

• Директор отвечает за проект.

  • More everyday / neutral.
  • Slight verbal feel: “he answers for it, he is the one held accountable.”

• Директор ответственен за проект.

  • Slightly more formal or written.
  • Uses the short-form adjective ответственен “responsible”.

Both are natural; in speech, отвечает за is extremely common in the sense of job responsibility.

Why is there no article like “the” before директор or проект in Russian?

Russian simply does not have articles (no “a/an/the”).

Which English article you choose depends on context, not on extra words in Russian:

• Директор отвечает за проект.
  can be:
  • The director is responsible for the project.
  • A director is responsible for the project. (if speaking generally)

Normally, if you’re talking about a specific, known person in a real situation, English will use “the director”, but Russian doesn’t mark that explicitly. Context (who you’re talking about) tells the listener whether it’s “a” or “the” in English terms.

If the director is a woman, do we still say Директор отвечает за проект, or does директор change?

You still say Директор отвечает за проект, even if the director is a woman.

Important points:

• Директор is grammatically masculine in standard Russian, regardless of the person’s actual gender.
• Verbs in the present tense (like отвечает) do not change for gender, only for person and number.
• In the past tense, you’d choose masculine or feminine:
  • Директор отвечал за проект. – if you treat the role grammatically as masculine
  • Директор отвечала за проект. – if you want to reflect that the person is a woman (this is very common now).

Colloquial feminine forms like директриса, директорша, директорка exist but can sound informal, old-fashioned, or stylistically marked, depending on context. Директор is the neutral, standard form.

Can отвечает here also mean “answers” like “answers questions”, or only “is responsible”?

Отвечает by itself can mean either:

1. answers / is replying

   • Он отвечает на вопросы. – He is answering questions.

2. is responsible / is accountable

   • Он отвечает за проект. – He is responsible for the project.

The meaning depends on the preposition and object:

• отвечать на что? → to answer something
• отвечать за что? → to be responsible for something

So in Директор отвечает за проект, with за, it clearly means “is responsible for”, not “answers (something)”.

Why is it отвечает, ending in -ет, and not something like отвечит?

Отвечает follows the regular present-tense conjugation of -ать verbs:

Infinitive: отвечать
Present tense, singular:

• я отвечаю
• ты отвечаешь
• он/она/оно отвечает

Pattern: stem отвеча- + endings -ю, -ешь, -ет.

So for он / она / директор, the correct form is отвечает, not ×отвечит.
Verbs ending in -ать almost never take -ит in the 3rd person singular.

Can I change the word order? For example, is За проект отвечает директор correct?

Yes, За проект отвечает директор is correct, and the meaning is basically the same, but the emphasis changes.

• Директор отвечает за проект.

  • Neutral, basic statement: The director is responsible for the project.

• За проект отвечает директор.

  • Emphasis moves to директор: It is the director who is responsible for the project (and not someone else).

Russian word order is relatively flexible; it often reflects what is new or emphasized information rather than strict grammatical roles. The subject is still директор, the verb is отвечает, and за проект remains the phrase showing what he is responsible for.

How do I make this sentence negative: “The director is not responsible for the project”?

You just add не before the verb:

• Директор не отвечает за проект.
  → The director is not responsible for the project.

Structure:

• Subject: Директор
• Negation + verb: не отвечает
• Object: за проект

The word order usually stays the same; the не goes directly in front of отвечает.