Think of it more as a fun and gentle ribbing than public shaming.

Toxic is not the highlighting of breaking the build with a trophy, it's what gets associated with it.

Imagine an "ugliest shirt" trophy, given out to whoever wheres the ugliest shirt of the week. At a fashion magazine, this may be toxic shaming. At a tech-heavy startup it might have people start buying the worst shirts they can to try to win it.

If the attitude associated with getting the trophy is condemnation, that's bad. If it's a reminder that everyone fucks and be careful, that's fine.

Oof that hits a sore spot. I was the 2016 Winner of the Ugliest Shirts Award at one of the first technology companies I worked at. Being singled out in front of all your peers for poor fashion sense and then the ensuing obligatory laugh ruined my opinion of that company's leadership. I would strongly encourage anyone in a professional environment (especially those in leadership roles) to keep comments on appearance to yourself.

I'm sorry to remind you of a bad time. I would like to point out that "2016 Ugliest Shirts" is a pretty different concept from "Person who wore the ugliest shirt this week" with a picture of you in a ratty beloved tee. It sounds like those were year end remarks, which means instead of judging an act they were judging your long term taste. Also it implies the most memorable thing about you was your shirt choice. And lastly, you weren't anticipating it, so you found out everyone was secretly judging you on something.

If, during orientation you were told a trophy gets given out every week for it, and some people wear really ugly shirts each Friday to try to win it, it would have felt very different.

But yeah, year end humorous awards like that probably belong confined to episodes of The Office.

Sounds like the definition of making it okay to fail.

The only consequence is a plush toy of shame on your desk until the next person fails? Yes, please.

Sounds like a great way to lighten the mood about failure.

Uh no, and please never work with me. The definition of "making it okay to fail" is a pat on the back and a retrospective to figure out what went wrong and prevent it from happening again.

Thank you for distinguishing yourself.

I'm not sure why you think a humorous plush toy precludes any of the other things you mention (retrospective, etc). I see a plush toy as something that makes failure an amusing thing to laugh at, rather than something to be hung up about.

But don't worry. At your request, I will not work with you.

What I meant is that we know, inside our blood cells, that breaking the build can happen to anyone, and probably will. The trophy is not public shaming, it's the camaraderie that comes from shared humility.

You say to somebody downthread "remind me never to work with you". I would find it difficult to work with someone as hyper sensitive -- on other people's behalf, yet! -- as you seem to be in this thread.