Situational. Sometimes you can ask, "Who needs to approve this decision?" or "Who controls the money?" It helps to have a good rapport with whoever your first contact is. In many ways, today's large enterprise Salespeople have to be good at helping their sponsor navigate their own company to get a sale done.
No but do you think in context of original article I'm not sure a celebrity would openly admit this. This is a power play question so the answer depends on who is in the room.