Just-in-Time Learning, learning while working

New tools, methods, and trends are coming every day. Keep your team up to date, without wasting time, thanks to theJust-in-time learning.

The evolution of training

The world is changing rapidly, new methods and tools are emerging, new industries are emerging. It is crucial for you that the skills of your teams are up to date in order to remain competitive. Many training solutions already exist. But it's hard to stay up to date without wasting time. Traditional learning methods take time, are difficult to adapt to the specific needs of your business, and do not take into account the particularities of each member of your team.

That's why theJust-in-time learning (or Just In Time Learning), which breaks the line between training and work in order to allow each member of your team to improve their skills while working.

In this article, we are going to see how theJust-in-time learning, is revolutionizing the approach to training, and why this is the method we have chosen at Mendo.

The consumption of information

Information has never been so easy to access. YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, in just a few clicks anyone can have access to any information they may need. It has completely changed our habits and consumption and the way we behave, no need to wait months for a book to be available near home, no need to remember everything, the information is at hand, at any time! The multiplication of information has also had another consequence, the decrease in attention span.

The average attention span has increased from 12 to 8 seconds since the year 2000.

But, contrary to our habits, corporate training has not evolved as much. The courses are virtual and accessible at any time, the videos have spread. But they are always courses, often poorly adapted to the specificities of the learner and above all, completely detached from work. The learner stops working, takes time to attend a course and then comes back to work. This separation makes the course abstract and disconnected from what the learner is actually doing while working. In addition, if he learns something but does not apply it quickly, he may forget it and not remember it when he needs it.

This separation makes learning less effective and less motivating for learners. Who would want to learn something without even knowing if it would really help them?

Learning differently

It is to respond to these problems that thecontextual learning has developed.

A learning method, where the learner is put in context, in order to be able to directly apply what he has learned and to reinforce his new knowledge.

There are several possible ways to makecontextual learning, the one we are going to see today is theJust-in-time learning.

A method that reduces the barriers between work and learning, by providing the user with the information they need, when they need it, while working. In this way, the learner does not stop working, does not lose focus and only receives information that is relevant to him. He will thus be able to immediately use this information in order to be more productive and retain it by putting it into practice directly.

It is important to understand that in theJust-in-time learning, work and training are a combination, one does not go without the other. Work helps to put training into context and training helps to make the learner more effective in their work.

The benefits of just-in-time learning

THEJust-in-time learning saves time, no need for long abstract courses. All members of your team have what they need when they need it, each training is adapted to the needs and the level of each person in order to optimize the progress of your teams.

No need to wait for the training period or for the arrival of a teacher to be able to progress. Your team no longer needs to waste time taking training because you may need it one day. Your time and that of your team are precious, don't waste them!

Concrete and immediate results. Your employees are supported as they work with the information they need, making them more productive and reducing errors, while allowing them to learn.

In psychology, the Flow is a mental state of intense concentration that can occur when a person is completely immersed in an activity.

These results allow the learner to immediately feel his rise in skills and thus to motivate him and encourage learning within the company.

According to a study by Gartner, the number of employees who want the training courses to be more”Just In Time“increased by 57% compared to 3 years ago.

THEJust-in-time learning is agile and available at all times, whether to onboard a newcomer or to adapt to a novelty in your sector of activity and allows you to react to market changes without wasting time organizing training sessions. It adapts to the specific needs of your team.

You can thus increase the productivity of your teams and manage your projects more effectively.

The flaws of just-in-time learning

Despite all these qualities and the numerous problems that it solves,Just-in-time learning also has flaws.

• The learner should have a basic level in the field. Training a brand-new employee who has no domain background can be complicated. He may need more guidance than what theJust-in-time learning can offer.
• It is necessary to assess the needs and the level of employees in order to be able to provide them with appropriate content at the right time. These evaluations can be complicated.
• Defining how much information to give to an employee in order to maximize their learning without making them leave work is difficult.

Attention to the information overload, too much information kills the information. If your team is bombarded with content, even relevant, it will be complicated to assimilate everything and put everything into practice. There is also a risk of confusion, fatigue and even discouragement and rejection of training.

Implement Just-in-Time Learning

Set up theJust-in-time learning may seem simple, after all, when you ask a colleague for something, when you have a problem and look for a solution on Google, you get the information you need, when you need it. It's fromJust-in-time learning.

But, using this method, finding what one is looking for is not always easy, and sometimes, in complex cases, someone may not even be aware of what they really need. And it's easy to get distracted and lose focus when you see more information than what you're looking for.

To be able to implement this effectively, it is necessary to:

• Give your team access to the information they need and assets at the right time.
• Divide information into short, easily digestible pieces.
• Provide this information in a way that is not likely to distract the employee.
• Allow employees to immerse themselves in their work and have access to information without leaving it.
• Detect the strengths and weaknesses of team members, in order to determine what information they need.
• Allow employees to work on their weak points repeatedly so that they retain information.

All these prerequisites make the implementation of a system ofJust-in-time learning complex. It is possible to use new technologies to study the level and needs of your employees and to automatically send them what they need, when they need it.

But this can be complicated to organize for a company, which is why there are companies in this field, which can offer your employees a system ofJust-in-time learnings turnkey that can be easily deployed.

Just-in-Time Learning at Mendo

At Mendo we believe that this way of learning surpasses others and has a huge untapped potential. That's why we decided to help businesses take advantage of it. We focused on a specific area: Microsoft Excel.

We have a virtual assistant that integrates directly into your team's Excel sheets. It analyzes the behavior of your employees and gives them advice to increase productivity, it warns them when they have made a mistake or have forgotten something. Above all, it recommends the right lessons at the right time. Thanks to it, they can work and learn at the same time, without even having to leave Excel.

The future of just-in-time learning

THEJust-in-time learning is still young and continues to develop. With technological advances, new training methods will continue to appear. But with the way information is now consumed, theJust-in-time learning will surely become more important within businesses.

To find out more

• Implementing Just in Time Learning
• Just in Time Training Best Practice to Adopt in Business
• What is Just In Time Learning