Almost unchanged from a previous answer of mine.

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While the whole Italian Army had certainly various flaws and limitations during WW1 - limitations that were not exclusive to the Italians though - and its Chief of Staff compounded on those with a "difficult" character, the Italian Army offered by all accounts its best performance ever during the Great War, holding its ground against a major European power on a secondary but for various reasons truly terrible front. In large part the negative take is the result of a common narrative arising as a reaction to the hagiographic treatment provided during the Fascist period to the various heroes of the Great War, and result of a tradition of deeply rooted hostility to all things military that might be difficult to understand in certain nations that never experienced such a deep divide between military world and civil world - a tradition already evident in the themes of public debate immediately after the war.

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This is not to excuse the conduct of military authorities, that often crossed the line from discipline into callousness during the war, and should therefore be held accountable, even in terms of their public legacy. Callousness though, that would be wrong to equate with incompetence.

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To see this points in better details, I'll begin with the front and the battles of the Isonzo River.

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Overall, while various improvements could have been made to the Italian tactical approach to the Isonzo River front during World War One, the overall strategic approach that required them to carry their offensive over the River course was in substance a necessity – note that the second best plan, that was actually suggested in opposition to (and also as a way to subtract the operation from) Cadorna's authority, was to relocate a large number of troops on the Albanian front and attack from there (Cadorna was the Chief of Staff on land under Italian military control, but the Albanian front fell within the allied sphere of influence); something that would have been a true logistic hell.
The front more or less constrained the directions of the Italian advance even on a tactical level: one towards the south, over Monfalcone towards Trieste and Fiume, the other across Gorizia but towards Ljubiana, pushing the front line like a revolving door fixed on the Mount Nero with a minor correction to remove the Austrian bridge head in Tolmino in order to bring the line on the course of the Isonzo until it crossed with the River Idria. This was in fact more or less the state of things still in 1917, as the various offensives had been a “work in progress” to achieve the aforementioned objectives. Of course to complete the southern advance one had better dislodge the enemy from the Italian left flank, which is to say dislodge the Austrians from the mountains on the left bank of the Isonzo (that would be these nice looking guys). With these factors in mind, very few could really fault Cadorna for the place and direction of the offensives – rather some take issue with the methods employed.

As for the overall strategic situation at the time of Italy's declaration of war in May 1915, the front was arranged into three sectors: the Austrian salient of the Tridentine Region; the mountain arc of Carnia and Cadore; the Isonzo River valley, for the most part running north to south, that is a valley in the way not along the way.
The Tridentine salient had to be reduced as much as possible, since it threatened the whole extension of the Italian forces towards east – and it would do so until the end of the war – but, unfortunately, it was not only marked by a sequence of higher and higher mountain peaks, but also heavily fortified
While the Italians had included an advance through the Carnian Alps in their first offensive plan (a direction that, once managed to pass Tarvisio would have opened the way into the valley of the River Drnava – for reference, this is Tarvisio: not the best terrain for a rapid advance), the bulk of the forces (15 divisions of the II and III Armies – later integrated with 7 from the reserve) was concentrated on the portion of front that offered the less unfavorable ground, the line of the Isonzo, from Tolmino to the sea. As G. Rochat explained “geography oriented the Italian offensive effort towards the Isonzo front”. And in fact the worst results in terms of gains and casualties actually took place during the first attempt made by the IV Army into the Carnian Alps to the north.
It didn't really help that Cadorna was a strong supporter of the French school of thought that favored a frontal assault following a substantial artillery preparation over maneuvering in order to gain a flank position – his tactical views were exposed and publicized within the Army Commands in a notorious pamphlet that Cadorna had written at the turn of the century: Attacco frontale e ammaestramento tattico and then reissued in large numbers in February 1915. The booklet soon became infamous among the trench officers as a symbol of the High Command obtusity and its detachment from the actual front condition. Nonetheless, there was nothing exceptional in it, not in terms of novelties or innovation, not in terms of particular backwardness; it was in large measure consistent with the similar doctrine proposed at the time by the French school of Josef Joffre. Since you couldn't move artillery fast enough to outflank your enemy with it, and the large fronts made impossible to maneuver in the same way XIX Century armies had done going around the enemy and taking position of favorable ground, the only possibility left was a heavy concentrated fire followed by advance in a rapid succession of platoons.

As for the French school, morale was the key element of success. The quality of the soldier rested on their will, resolution and discipline. But there were also clear political motivations for the Italian offensive. Italy had apparently timed its intervention with the expectation of providing the last blow to the Austrian house of cards. Unfortunately, on early May 1915 an Austro-German offensive (Gorlice-Tarnow) had surprisingly sent the Russian into a rushed retreat; so that the Austrian situation was slightly less difficult when the Italians declared war. More so, due to the difficulties of preparations, the Italians could not (or just did not, that something better might have been achieved) advance deep into the Austrian lands, contenting themselves with following the retreating Austrians onto their fortified defensive lines; the Austrians had in fact all the time to even “relocate” some 70,000 civilians of suspect loyalty from the border regions. Nonetheless, it was apparent that the Austrians would have been more than happy of jut holding their defensive line with as few men as possible (note that the Austrians had left some troops there even in times of Italian neutrality – for very obvious reasons – so that they had not been forced to divert much resources on the already solid mountain fortifications); therefore the task of engaging the enemy fell on the Italians who had to take an offensive stance, a fact that their allies frequently reminded them.
So far, this would explain the general ideas behind Cadorna's offensive plans on the Italian front, and how his strategic and tactical conduct was neither particularly impressive nor particularly incompetent. But, as the drunken analogy I quickly conjured up should suggest, there were other reasons to question Luigi Cadorna's conduct of the Italian war – reasons that went beyond the choice of the offensive ground.