5 Benefits of Microlearning in the Workplace

Employees are busier than ever as they balance responsibilities in an often-changing workplace. It’s hard enough to add one more project to their tasks, let alone find time to learn. But, for employees to continue growing in their roles and careers, they need to find ways to keep their skills sharp. Enter microlearning, a learning strategy and a proven solution to the challenge of making time for learning.

Instead of overwhelming people with a time-intensive information dump, microlearning teaches them just enough about a subject to achieve a specific learning goal. Employees can learn a new skill in the flow of their work and immediately apply it. In short, microlearning in the workplace delivers the training employees need when they need it.

Here are five benefits of microlearning in the workplace.

1. Achieve goals faster 

Setting and achieving yearly learning goals can be difficult for many employees. When the pace of everyday life sets in, it gets trickier to stick to those long-term goals. A large goal like “getting better at Excel” falls off the priority list if a learner thinks they need to set aside hours to achieve it. But when microlearning is used to learn through frequent bursts, employees uplevel their expertise faster.

2. Offers flexibility 

Microlearning lessons are designed to easily fit into an employee’s schedule easily. The standalone lessons are short and intended to be consumed in one sitting versus some traditional all-day workshops. It’s built so that learners can skim course content and focus on the lessons most relevant to their role and how they want to improve.

3. Immediately applicable skills

Shorter learning opportunities within the flow of work helps employees put newly acquired skills into action faster. Lessons centered around a single skill mimics how we learn outside of work. For instance, we might search for a cooking technique online and immediately the technique after watching a video on it. Employees can do the same, searching through a learning platform for a lesson that gives them the skills needed to resume and accomplish their work. 

4. Reinforces learning

Instead of packing an entire day or hour with information, microlearning is structured so that learners revisit concepts regularly. Research shows that 90% of learners improved their performance when learning is spaced out frequently over time rather than cramming studies into a few hours.

5. Higher learner engagement 

Our brains can only take on so much learning at one time before we see cognitive overload. The bite-sized chunks of microlearning don’t tax our minds and our attention spans like hours-long learning might. Learner engagement tends to drop after 10-12 minutes of focus. Short video lessons under 20 minutes meet that sweet spot of effective learning.

Big wins, microlearning

As employees continue to navigate shifts in the workplace, finding time for learning will also be a challenge. Adding microlearning to your L&D programs will help your employees access learning in their moment of need. This leads to higher learner engagement as they can focus on their lessons with less opportunities for distraction. 

To start planning how to implement microlearning in your company, speak with our learning experts for a look at our exclusive Smart Tips courses.