I've had experiences like that both as CTO and Director of Engineering - I vividly remember one exchange when I'd been at a company for a month or so:
CEO: How are you fitting in?
Me: Good, I've got a good handle on where we want to take the product.
CEO: I know you don't.
Me: OK, care to explain?
CEO: I've just changed the vision for the product!
This was also a company with a significant hardware component.
