CELab - Ep 178 - From Order Taker to Trusted Consultant: How Action Mapping & Brainstorm Transformed Customer Education at Quickbase

In this episode, we are joined by Ashley DeKerlegand, Director of Customer Education and CX Enablement at Quickbase, to unpack how she transformed Quickbase University from “optional training” into a core driver of expansion and reduced churn. Ashley shares her journey from manufacturing and product training into SaaS, how she built and now leads a 12-person global team, and why Quickbase’s customer education program is tightly woven into the company’s onboarding and Failure-to-Launch strategy.

Ashley and Dave go deep on action mapping as a performance-first design framework, how Ashley evaluated 13+ learning platforms before choosing Brainstorm, and why private, co-branded customer portals have become a game-changer for governance, security, and adoption. You’ll hear how she partners with Sales, CS, and Product, uses customer interviews and Gong calls to shape strategy, and is now reorienting learning paths around AI-powered app building and customer-specific use cases.

Episode Highlights:

• How Ashley repositioned Customer Education from “nice-to-have” to core expansion strategy at Quickbase  
• Using Failure to Launch (no app built in 60–90 days) as a key churn signal and CE design input  
• Moving from order-taking (“we need a course”) to strategic problem-solving using action mapping  
• The four blocker categories in action mapping: environment, knowledge, skill, and motivation  
• Why traditional frameworks like ADDIE/SAM often break down in fast-moving SaaS environments  
• The power of private, branded customer portals for governance, security, and co-created content  
• Turning CSMs, TAMs, and Sales into educators and content contributors (without overwhelming them)  
• and much, much more ...