Microlearning, which some people also call micro training, is a learning or training strategy that breaks difficult and complex topics into short modules and creates stand-alone pieces of information, which learners can use to go over the specific concepts as many times as they want. These small pieces of information can be accessed wherever you are and whenever you want.
The modules created in microlearning are designed to be consumed in about five minutes and address only a specific concept at a time. People find microlearning valuable as the information shared is consumed quickly without hampering production or performance while working. It is better than the long in-person sessions that require a specific schedule to complete the training.
Microlearning has helped us pass the days of lengthy PowerPoint presentations and long learning sessions. The organizations have adopted bite-sized training strategies to train their workforce. This new way of learning has proven to be beneficial for the modern workforce and has also proven to be more engaging, efficient, and cost-effective.
Important Elements of Microlearning
Employees learn more in less time with microlearning. The important elements of microlearning are:
- It is a cost-effective way of learning and training.
- Delivery of training is rapid and efficient.
- Promotes collaborative learning.
- Easy and flexible training modules.
- Accurate and to-the-point course content.
Benefits of Microlearning for Small Businesses
Microlearning has become a vital tool in all businesses (big, medium, or small) and is gradually gaining popularity.
Providing effective training and development courses to your employees brings multiple benefits to your business. It helps in increasing productivity and ROI, improves employee retention, and boosts employee motivation.
During the current pandemic situation, microlearning has become popular, but a lot of organizations are still skeptical about whether microlearning is the right strategy for their business.
Microlearning delivers multiple benefits. A few of them are mentioned below.
1) Improved ROI
There are times when online learning provides lower knowledge retention and course completion rates. But, with microlearning, tackling these challenges becomes a lot easier.
The learners become more engaged with the learning content as the courses provided are shorter and easier to understand. The longer courses are tiresome and take a lot of time off the workday.
Now, if your learners are completing the courses, they will use the acquired knowledge in their day-to-day tasks. This will help improve their productivity and the quality of work they deliver. As a result, you will witness an improved return on investment on your L&D efforts.
2) Better Engagement for learners
Microlearning focuses on providing precise and to-the-point learning, which helps in keeping the learners engaged. Since the learning content is short, the learners don’t get bored while training.
With the help of microlearning, the employers of small businesses feel confident that their employee training program is effective and they can complete the modules quickly, in comparison to hour-long sessions.
Since the modules created in microlearning are short and are also available on multiple platforms, like – mobile phones, tablets, and laptops, it becomes easier for the employees to remember the course content and remain engaged.
3) Uses multiple media forms
Microlearning courses are created using multiple media forms that also help in increasing the engagement of the learners. With these media forms, the information that is provided becomes interesting and memorable for long period.
Some of the media forms included are – games, videos, text, infographics, and images. The use of these media forms makes the learning experience fun, which isn’t found in traditional training sessions.
4) Learners prefer microlearning
The learners or the employees of small industries prefer microlearning to traditional long training sessions in training rooms. Small businesses are realizing the efficacy of microlearning for modern-day learners.
Today’s learners or millennial learners prefer informal training, available on-demand, and training that is customized to their needs. Microlearning makes the employees understand and digest the course material quickly. The employees can even multi-task between the training, and can even retain the content.
5) Affordable training
Training costs are too high and at times it becomes challenging for the small businesses to take care of those charges. You have to train your employees and to provide that training you will have to keep them away from their desks, these results in reduced production.
Instead of making the employees sit for long training sessions, which involves churning out a large sum of money to conduct that training along with hampered production, you can opt for low-cost microlearning course content. Microlearning makes training and learning affordable.
6) Rapid creation of course content
The instructors need a lot of time, maybe 2-3 working days, to create a one-hour training session. But when it comes to microlearning, the instructors can create the courses rapidly.
Learning management systems also play a vital role when creating a microlearning course. You can use the templates available on an LMS; this also expedites the course creation. At times you can create microlearning courses in less than ten seconds. Using an LMS for microlearning is great and is also a cost-effective way of training.
7) Reduces overload and improves knowledge retention
Employees can easily access small bite-sized information instead of lengthy course content. This reduces the mental pressure to absorb everything in one go, and the learners can take in the key takeaways.
Microlearning does not overload the working memory of the employees. When the memory is not overburdened, it leads to an increase in knowledge retention. When the employees can evaluate the information, they will likely remember it more. With microlearning, you can reduce the forgetting curve of your employees.
Conclusion
Since the outbreak of Covid-19, organizations, both big and small, have well understood the importance of microlearning and its effectiveness in integrating into the employee’s everyday work schedule.
Microlearning is loaded with benefits for employees and employers. It is easily accessible and is also mobile-friendly. The learners can train remotely using their smartphones and tablets. Providing regular training to your employees will result in the growth of your employees and will motivate them to work even harder to excel in their roles.
