The number fourteen myth about Generation Y is that they are so self-focused they will never make good managers.

Here's what we've learned. Often when you find a young self-starter who is doing well at his or her job, you think that would be a good person to promote. But we put people in positions of supervisory responsibility because they're good at their jobs and they're self-starters, not necessarily because they are good at managing people. And I don't think any generation has a particular bead on good management.

Unfortunately what happens is we put people in these roles and we teach them how to do a little bit of extra paper work but we never teach them how to do the people work. And especially if you are young and inexperienced, well sometimes it's hard to establish your credibility as a new manager. Maybe yesterday you were one of the guys and today you are managing those people and they’re looking at you and thinking, "Hey, who made you Mr. Fancy?" And all of a sudden you start soft-pedaling your authority. Maybe you try to act like just one of the team and every once in a while you try to exercise your authority and it doesn't go too well so you go back to soft-pedaling.

And that's how young managers often get into bad habits. And over time these habits become cemented. If you're going to put a young person who is a self-starting high-performer in a position of supervisory responsibility, you've got to teach him how to do the people work.