You will hear another five recordings. Five people are talking about project management. For each recording, decide what action

Eighteen
I can tell you from my own experience that the most important thing in project management is not to try to do everything yourself. That’ll lead to problems sooner rather than later. You must plan which tasks you really need to do yourself and then delegate responsibility for each of the other tasks to others. You should of course, make sure the members of your team have the initiative and flexibility necessary for such responsibilities.
[pause]
Nineteen
I think, it’s absolutely crucial that all the people to whom you’ve delegated responsibilities should get together at least once a month so that you can all share information about how your own bits of the project are going. If you don’t do that, then it’s easy to assume something has been done by someone else when it hasn’t - after all, not everyone has the same level of motivation. Email contact is great, of course, but nothing beats face-to-face communication.
[pause]
Twenty
You have to get off to a good start which means you have to be absolutely clear about what your aims are right from the start. These should be discussed with the team and should be put in writing so that everyone shares full knowledge about the precise parameters of the project. I know from several projects I’ve been involved with that confusion about goals often leads to problems early on, problems which could very easily have been prevented.
[pause]
Twenty-one
When you’re working on a new project, you have to delegate, of course. But, if anything starts to go wrong you should handle it yourself. As project manager, it is up to you to keep a close eye on how things are progressing. You should try to predict any difficulties and sort them out immediately so the project can move on. There are many tasks that can be handed over to other people, but not this.
[pause]
Twenty-two
Planning things in detail is, of course, vital. However, it makes sense to ensure that your initial plan incorporates a degree of adaptability. You and your project team can’t assume that circumstances will stay the same for ever, and so it makes sense for your plan not to be so rigid that it cannot take account of any developments and changes in circumstance. It should not, of course, need to stray from its basic objectives.