I suppose I'm focusing on the U.K. specifically. We've all heard how the junior officers had no idea what they were doing, sending their men over the trenches for no logical reason, and the mid/high ranking officers were removed from the action and tried to wage a Napoleonic war strategically.

Edit: I'm not saying/implying that the majority of officers in WWII were incompetent. They obviously learned their lessons well during the inter-war period. I'm more interested if people in general were like "hey, during the last war, all these elites didn't exactly do so hot. Are they better prepared now?"