I didn't get that impression - I got the impression that both CEOs are trying to form a model in their heads. But the developer CEO is building his from the bottom up - he seeks information on the details, and then will let general principles coalesce out of that data. The sales CEO is building his from the top down - he wants to understand the gestalt of the conversation first, and then he'll fill in the details later.
Computers teach us to pay attention to the details first, because they're very unforgiving if we get them wrong, while people will often fill them in for us if we provide a compelling-enough top-level vision. I find I thought much like the sales CEO up through college, while I'm much more inclined now to trust my intuition to produce a top-level picture once I've assembled a bunch of disparate facts.
With a bottom up approach you are trying to prove or disprove the model in your head. Or at least only slightly mold it.
There's no way to learn more than that because you've already fixed the foundation. This is a good strategy when you've already been working on something for a while and you have made some firm bets or if you've done this thing before to some relative success.
The sales guys is usually going to be better if you really want to understand a new customer from ground up.
Whereas the Sale Guy CEO is trying to allow a model to form in his head.
I think you will learn more using the second method. But for a programmer to accept the second view is very hard. It requires us to shut the eff up.