Electronic cigarettes in the workplace: Could they boost productivity?

A proposed state bill that would ban electronic cigarettes in California workplaces could hurt productivity and office morale, a Los Angeles business consultant said an interview Tuesday.

"I think that shuffling your workforce out into a grubby area outside to get a fix on their 'habit' must feel a little degrading at best," David Anderson, CEO of David Anderson Wealth. said.

"You know, it’s important for everybody in the workplace to be positive and upbeat. Permitting electronic cigarettes is a way for non-smoking co-workers to integrate better in the social coffee breaks," Anderson added.

A bill currently before the California assembly would ban electronic cigarettes from the workplace. BillSB648, which passed the Senate May 24, would treat the battery-operated devices like traditional cigarettes, forbidding their use in all public places.

Although California enjoys the second lowest smoking rate in the country, about 3.8 million, 14 percent, of the state's adults smoke, according to the latest statistics available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Anti-smoking laws in Los Angeles county provide protection against the dangers of secondhand smoke and the county's nicotine patch giveaway program may help some smokers give up the habit.

But until, unless, LA becomes a smoke-free zone, businesses that allowed ecigarettes in the workplace could recover substantial work productivity costs that have been lost due to indoorsmoking bans.

If an employer had 10 smokers on his payroll and each smoker took a single 10-minute smoking break per shift, that would amount to 100 minutes of lost productivity time each work day. If the employer paid his workers the national average hourly wage of $23.63 per hour, the loss in productivity would add up to nearly $40 a day or $10,000 a year.

If those 10 workers took 5, 10-minute smoking breaks per day, the productivity loss would total $50,000.

Anderson says that any time you leave a task for 10 to 15 minutes,"you can kiss goodbye to a further 15 minutes (at least) to get back to the task."

By his estimate, allowing electronic cigarettes in the workplace could recover $100,000 annually in productivity if a staff included 10 smokers.

An employer could avoid these productivity losses by refusing to hire smokers or docking the pay of any worker who stepped outside for an on-the-clock cigarette break. But for small business owners whose staff includes valuable workers with nicotine habits, allowing electronic cigarettes in the workplace could prove a financially attractive alternative.