What is Microlearning and How it Helps in Effective Corporate Training?

Are your learners struggling with long and monotonous training sessions, losing interest halfway through? Today’s workforce comes with a full calendar and a short attention span. Do you think those dreadful eLearning sessions are going to work for them? I hardly think so. What the modern workforce needs are bite-size, relevant, and engaging learning sessions. Enter Microlearning!

Yes! Microlearning will save you from those monotonously long training sessions. Through this blog let us understand what microlearning is and what it is not and also how is it helpful.

What is Microlearning and What it is Not?

Microlearning is a flexible learning approach that focuses on offering learners bite-sized relevant chunks of information. Microlearning is an effective and efficient form of training that can help in improving individual and organizational performance. It is quite easy to make out the meaning of microlearning from the word itself.

MICRO – Small and Focused

LEARNING – Acquiring new Knowledge, Skillset, and Abilities

Microlearning is not:

• Just one simple format.
• Simply dividing the content into smaller modules.
• Always appropriate for all situations.
• Always a one-stop solution, sometimes it is an array of learning.
• Something ‘new’, it has been prevalent for some time now.

Microlearning is not always videos as there is a misconception, microlearning solutions also include:

• Animations
• Infographics
• Mobile Apps
• Bogs
• Simulations
• Quizzes
• eBooks
• Games and so much more…

Microlearning could be a one-stop solution for some while it could also be a learning journey for some. It depends on the learning objectives and type of learning content. Microlearning has proved to be beneficial for learners as well as organizations.

Go through this webinar recording and explore ways to develop microlearning quickly and enhance employee performance!

Advantages of Microlearning

1. Time-Efficient

Microlearning serves nugget-sized chunks of information, which is going to save the learner’s time as well as yours. The courses will take a fairly lesser amount of time to be created than conventional eLearning courses. While you are spending hours creating long courses and at the same time, learners have to sit for hours to complete that one course.

Well! Not anymore, creating microlearning courses will save you that time. Microlearning courses will also save learners time as it will be easy to fit short courses into their busy schedules.

2. Accessibility

The modern workforce believes in a just-a-click-away approach. They are a mobile-friendly generation. Microlearning offers them an option to take learning courses anytime, anywhere, and on any device. Sounds too good to be true right. Well! Microlearning offers mobile learning and so much more.

The courses are accessible to them easily and with just a click, this motivates them to learn and hence increases their interest in learning. Traveling? Waiting for an appointment? Waiting in line to grab a sandwich? Why don’t you complete a training module by then! Yes, it is that easy now!

3. Engaging Courses

With being time-saving and easily accessible the courses are really engaging too. As the courses are small and take very little time to complete and keep the learners engaged throughout. Microlearning courses offer relevant information eliminating all the useless excess information, and that is what the current workforce requires. They need courses with relevant and engaging information. Because it keeps the learners engaged, training completion rates are also higher for these modules, which keeps the learners motivated.

4. Enhanced Retention

Retaining knowledge could be a task for learners as they already have so much on their plate. Microlearning will help in beating the forgetting curve and keep the learners’ knowledge refreshed and up to date.

It is beneficial for your learners if you create courses that are short and crisp and at the same time build on the learners existing skills and knowledge. Microlearning can also be used to create revision and follow-up courses based on existing eLearning courses that learners have already completed, this is going to help them retain the existing knowledge and also keep updated on current trends.

5. Cost-Effective

Microlearning courses are comparatively cheaper to produce. You will need fewer resources to create microlearning courses. You can create the best out of your training budget, you can create more courses within the same budget.

Even though there are tools available to help you create microlearning content, However, there is not always a requirement for any special “microlearning tool”. You can also use existing content to create bite-sized modules, which will take less time and also reduce costs.

6. Works For Millennial Workforce

Actually, not only for millennials but microlearning works for any generation. The ultimate goal of any learner is to learn new knowledge or skill and apply it in their job to achieve personal and organizational goals. However, in the case of the millennial workforce microlearning has been proved to be a boon. As we already know millennials are a mobile-friendly generation if they have the access to learning anytime and anywhere it is easy for them to fit it into their calendar.

Millennials enjoy casual and easy learning instead of text-heavy courses, and this is exactly what microlearning offers.

7. Instant Feedback

The feedback in microlearning courses is almost instant. Microlearning courses provide short quizzes and assessments with instant results. As microlearning uses cutting-edge strategies, Artificial intelligence can be used to suggest further steps to the learners’ post-assessment results. The whole process is advantageous to the learner and the organization as well. Organizations would be aware of the individual performance of the employees and can take remedial steps for the same because microlearning also offers personalized learning.

Saying Yes to Microlearning!

Say no to those painfully long learning sessions and say yes to microlearning! Your current workforce will thank you for that. I am sure by now you would have a fair idea of what microlearning is and it can be easily said in the case of microlearning that big things come in small packages.

Microlearning focuses on individual learning and is a flexible learning approach. It is an adaptive, flexible, and learner-centric learning approach, which also improves employee motivation and loyalty. Microlearning courses can be easily created, updated, reused, and repurposed. We now know that microlearning is here to stay!

Happy ‘micro’ learning!

Planning to incorporate microlearning into your learning journey? Grab this eBook and find out where microlearning fits in your learning strategy!