Successful brands listen

I've reccently read the posting: The New Economics of Brands by Umair Haque, who is Director of the Havas Media Lab and contributor to many notable publications on digital technologies.

One of his quotes about company communications really resonated with me:

"The future of communications as advantage lies in talking less and listening
more."

Note: However, I do think that he has not made the clear differentiation between brands and advertising. It is possible to advertise a product or servcie, without necessarily creating a brand (and vice-versa).

Now listening in humans is either a learnt or natural skill that many people do not have. The the same is also true of companies. Learning to listen correctly, to hear not just what you want to hear, is especially hard, hard, hard!

So, is listening correctly part of your company DNA?