Have you ever worked in a factory? Because I can imagine that factory management could also lose touch and make decisions that would leave the people on the "factory floor", who have better knowledge about what the machines can and can't do, bewildered. There are however several things that make this less likely: first, some companies have a policy of management having to actually work on a production line (or as a worker in a restaurant, etc.) from time to time so that they know the basics of what's going on there; second, the technology of a factory is maybe easier to grasp and doesn't change that fast as in IT. But still, if you want an example, I bet many of the problems Boeing is having is because their management is (or was until recently) located in Chicago, while their factories are in Seattle and South Carolina.