The Organizational Impact of Smoke Break Management in Strategic Air Command
Abstract
This study investigated the organizational impact of smoke break management in Strategic Air Command. Analysis of data from a survey questionnaire showed that although the smoking and smoke break issues touched the majority of the people in SAC and almost every smoker surveyed reported taking smoke breaks, just 27 percent of respondents reported their organization had a smoke break policy. Most of these respondents indicated the policies were lenient in terms of regulating the time and duration of the breaks. Smokers reported spending an average 41.09 minutes per day taking smoke breaks. This figure differed significantly from the time smokers reported other smokers spent taking smoke breaks, and the time reported by managers and nonsmokers. Over 96% of smokers reported talking about work at least weekly, indicating that smoker networking occurs. Nonsmokers perceived that as average daily smoke break time increased, intergroup conflict and inequity between smokers and nonsmokers increased and smoker productivity decreased. However, stepwise regression run on the variables that determined daily smoke break time failed to account for a significant portion of the variance in nonsmokers perceptions. Therefore, managing the variables that determine daily smoke break time to manipulate nonsmokers' perceptions may not be productive.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 1991
- Accession Number
- ADA246790
Entities
People
- Glenn G. Hinken
Organizations
- Air Force Institute of Technology