It could be they were burned by a previous employer and are a bit jaded now. If you're fair and open in your dealings with them and share in the success of the

It could be they were burned by a previous employer and are a bit jaded now. If you're fair and open in your dealings with them and share in the success of the company (not that you're not doing these things already) their attitude may change. A lot of "good CEO training" involves learning how to get the most output with the least input when it comes to employees. I think they assume people don't know what they're doing, but it just leads to an adversarial environment.