The Rise of Microlearning: Why Short, Interactive Training Works Best

Traditional learning methods often struggle to keep employees engaged and have the demerit of being time-consuming - getting employees away from their work to immerse in training can strain both their flow and the organization's day-to-day function.

Enter microlearning - the modern-day solution for busy employees. By trimming down large-scale learnings into bite-sized micro tiers, employees can work through modules in far less time, spacing out the next topic without burning out. This has great advantages to teams, as they're able to pace their learnings and absorb information in a much more digestible manner.

Microlearning isn’t just a theory: it’s a proven neuroscience.

By respecting the neuroscience behind learning, information consumption, and attention spans, it’s possible to design an e-learning curriculum that takes various learning preferences and areas into consideration that are relevant to your organization's training needs and context.

Here are some key benefits of incorporating microlearning in your organization:

- Increased Attention & Knowledge Retention: Human attention spans are naturally limited. By delivering information in chunks, your teams can understand and retain more information over longer periods.

- Improved Engagement & Learner Satisfaction: Microlearning modules are designed to be interactive and varied to keep learners engaged and motivated throughout their sessions.

- Flexibility: Learners have autonomy over how and when they learn, ensuring that their productivity at work isn't affected by day-long training sessions.

- Cost Effectiveness: Developing and distributing microlearning content is often far less expensive than traditional learning methods, needing far fewer resources to execute and sustain.

- Targeted Learning: Your employees can be given learning modules that directly relate to their work, targeting growth areas in a more meaningful and relevant manner.

While there is no one-size-fits-all approach to incorporating microlearning in your organization, a key point to remember is your learner's target goals and the overall objective of the training. By designing content that is relevant to each learner, factors such as frequency, duration of modules, and content can be adjusted on the fly, keeping your organization's training goals in mind.

Sajid Hussain

Consultant | Activ8